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Dr. Stacy Atchley Chairman & Professor

Dr. Peter Allen Professor

Dr. Kenny Befus Assistant Professor

Dr. Vincent Cronin Professor

Dr. Steven Driese Associate Dean for Research, Graduate School & Professor

Dr. John Dunbar Associate Professor

Dr. Steve Dworkin Professor & Undergraduate Program Director

Dr. Steve Forman Professor

Dr. James Fulton Assistant Professor

Dr. Don Greene Professor

Dr. William Hockaday Associate Professor

Dr. Peter James Assistant Professor

Dr. Scott James Assistant Professor

Dr. Lee Nordt Dean, College of Arts & Sciences & Professor

Dr. Daniel Peppe Associate Professor & Graduate Program Director

Dr. Elizabeth Petsios Assistant Professor

Dr. Jay Pulliam W.M. Keck Foundation Professor of Geophysics

Dr. Joe Yelderman Professor

EmeritusDr. Harold BeaverDr. Rena BonemDr. Tom GoforthDr. Don Parker

Sharon Browning Teaching Lab Coordinator

Wayne Hamilton Program Consultant, Laboratory Safety Coordinator

Liliana Marin Geoscience Instrumentation Specialist, Luminescence Geochronology Research

Tim Meredith Instrumentation Specialist and Computer Systems Admin, Paleomagnetism and Geophysics Labs

Dr. Ren Zhang Stable Isotope Mass Spectrometry Technician

AdminsPaulette Penney Office Manager

Janelle Atchley Administrative Associate

Jamie Ruth Administrative Associate

Faculty

GeosciencesALUMNI NEWSLETTER | FALL 2018

Staff

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Department of GeosciencesOne Bear Place #97354Waco, TX 76798-7354

From the ChairA new look and new faculty transitions. Here, Dr. Stacy Atchley shares what's new with the department this year.

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FacultyCatch up on the latest and greatest from our esteemed faculty. And meet our newest professor.

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StaffOur talented and dedicated staff share what's new in their areas— everything from lab analyses to lab safety.

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MoreFollow along with Field Camp. See our recent graduates and awards. Catch up with our alumni. And more!

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Dear Friends

I hope you're enjoying our “new look” newsletter, which we debuted last year. It's gotten many compliments, and credit goes to our new graphics design and copy editor, Elizabeth Befus, wife of Assistant Profes-sor Dr. Kenny Befus. She brings a great deal of industrial graphic design and copy edit experience. Although our previous newslet-ters were good, our redesigned newsletter is outstanding. Many thanks to Elizabeth!

Beyond the newsletter, we're also currently overhauling our departmental web page, under the leadership of Dr. Dan Peppe. Our hope is to go live with the new site sometime in 2019. Stay tuned!

Faculty updatesWe've had some key faculty transitions this year. Dr. Rena Bonem retired in May 2018, and the Department of Geosciences hosted a cel-ebration of her career on May 1, 2018. Many thanks to Dr. Bonem’s friends, colleagues, and students who attended. As some of you know, I received my B.S. degree from Baylor Geology in 1984 and was a student in Dr. Bonem’s inaugural Paleontology class in 1981. So I can speak from first-hand experience

that Dr. Bonem was an excellent teacher. She was exceptionally well organized, excited about the rich subject matter, and most importantly, cared for her students. Although retiring, Dr. Bonem will stay in Waco, and in Fall 2018 will teach her last section of Inverte-brate Paleontology as a temporary Lecturer. This gives our newly hired invertebrate paleontologist, Dr. Elizabeth Petsios, time to set up her research space and develop her curriculum. We welcome Dr. Petsio’s arrival in August 2018! Dr. Petsios received her B.Sc. from Cornell University and Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. She special-izes in echinoderms, with particular interest in their evolutionary response to events lead-ing to mass extinction.

By the numbersOur undergraduate program currently has 55 majors and 7 minors. The majors include 50 Geology, 3 Earth Science, and 2 Geophys-ics. We also have 42 students enrolled in our graduate program: 15 M.S. and 27 Ph.D. Plus, we have 4 new M.S. and 3 Ph.D. students joining us in Fall 2018. Our graduate students have once again been very productive, and over the past year have authored 12 journal

articles and delivered 25 presentations at professional society meetings. In addition, 4 Ph.D. and 5 M.S. students graduated this past year.

Remembering Dr. BrownFinally, it is with a heavy heart that I report the passing of Emeritus Professor Dr. Bill Brown on January 17, 2018, and his beloved wife Claretta on March 10, 2018. Our heartfelt condolences are extended to their family and friends. I was also an undergraduate student at Baylor when Dr. Brown joined the Department of Geology in 1981 and had the privilege of being a student in his inaugural Structural Geology class. I recall fondly Dr. Brown’s enthusiasm in sharing topics such as “down-plunge viewing” and the signifi-cance of “rabbit-ear” structures. Even more fondly, I remember field trips to the Arbuckle Mountains where Dr. Brown introduced me to camping in sub-freezing weather and Pick’s Tamales in Ardmore Oklahoma. I miss Dr. Brown. ▲

Let's connect.Follow us on social media for news about upcoming events and info about our activities and research.

Facebook: facebook.com/baylorgeosciences

Twitter: twitter.com/BaylorGeo

Instagram: instagram.com/baylorgeosciences

A letter from Dr. Stacy Atchley, Chair of the Geosciences Department and Professor of Petroleum and Stratigraphy

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESCHAIR

NEWSLETTER FALL 2018 4COVER PHOTO BY JUSTIN LEUBKE 4

Key projectsJohn Dunbar and I worked diligently on two projects with Halff Engineering Inc. in the City of Coppell, north Dallas. The first project involved assessing erosion and subsequent deposition of sand transport in a levee district and its potential impact on flood potential in the region. The second project involved assessment of erosion hazard of a stretch of Denton Creek, also in north Dallas, in which about 45 homes were having erosion problems and the timing and extent of the problem had to be evaluated for the city.

This spring, John Dunbar, Joseph White (Biol-ogy), and I began another interesting project on assessing the erosional stability and flood implications of the Blanco River in San Marcos. In this study, we used our first drone assessment of critical erosion areas, which we coupled with ground-based surveys and sub-merged jet testing and analysis. This project will be finished up early this summer.

On the home frontIn the Fall, Annabel (daughter #3) completed the Chicago Marathon. In January, I ventured to Denver for Christmas with Maggie (daugh-ter #2) and both grandchildren (Simon and Eloise), and then got on a plane for India.

A trip to IndiaIn January, I also traveled to the 2018 International SWAT Conference. Here I gave a keynote address along with Jeff Arnold (USDA/ARS) at IIT (Indian Technological University) Madras in the city of Chennai. We also met with scientists from all over India and discussed water problems and the continuing

use of the SWAT Watershed model, which was adopted for use by the Water Ministry for all of India.

We are planning to help scientists at the Uni-versity as they assess sedimentation, erosion, and water supply issues over the next years. India is facing extreme water shortages; it is estimated that 600,000,000 people are deal-ing with high to extreme water shortage (the country has 16% of the world’s population but only 4% of global water). As 80% of the water is used for irrigation and agriculture, models like SWAT can help to better understand the scope of the problem and perhaps lead to better management practices within a very complicated water structure.

Teaching and studentsI continue to teach classes in Physical Geol-ogy and Hydrology. And my MS student, Lance Auguste, finished up his Master's and is now employed by Vertex.

PublicationsWe continue to publish articles on the ap-plication and enhancement of ecohydrologi-cal models as SWAT including papers on 1) Decision Tables to Simulate Management in Modeling, 2) a Gully headcut advance model for assessing the impact of gully erosion in watersheds, 3) a paper on streambank erosion within large scale watersheds, 4) a paper on regional baseflow (Georgia), and 5) papers illustrating the structure of the new SWAT model called SWAT+. I have worked on the periphery of exciting work with Kathy Breen on using AI (directed by Scott James) in watershed and remote sensing applications as well as with John Dunbar, who is doing

some ground-breaking work in 3D modeling of streams in which he is able to model full-blown turbulence. ▲

Dr. Peter AllenAnother great year full of interesting classes, hydrology projects, and a trip to Chennai, India.

Professor of Hydrology &

Engineering Geology

A year in picturesA. Teaching "Dynamic Earth" as usual going on 40 years.

B. Denton Creek North Texas Levee District study downstream of Grapevine Dam for Halff Associates, Inc. Sand from upstream degrada-tion is filling the levee, which can contribute to flooding.

C. Denton Creek, City of Coppell. Erosion of stream impacts about 45 homes. We evalu-ated rates of erosion and relationship to exist-ing homes.

D. Trip to Chennai, India in January for SWAT 2018 International Conference. There, I was a keynote speaker.

E. Spring semester, I taught Hydrology and Dynamic Earth.

F. This spring, I studied channel stability and flooding on Blanco River for the City of San Marcos. In 2015, they had a 300-year flood.

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NEWSLETTER FALL 2018

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESFACULTY

NEWSLETTER FALL 20187 8


Dr. Stacy Atchley

Greetings to our alumni and friends, and thanks to all who have taken the time to stop by for a visit when passing through Waco. It is always a highlight of my day when old friends or former students drop in for an unexpected visit. Because Baylor is a cross roads to many within my historic social circle, this happens fairly often.

Student updatesLast summer, two of my former M.S. students graduated, Kristin Arndt and Alyssa Johnson, and both are gainfully employed. Kristin is working as an intern for Chesapeake Energy, and Alyssa is an intern for the National Park Service at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. Reports from both are that all is going very well. Another former student, Caitlin Leslie (co-advised with Dan Peppe) graduated in May 2018 with her Ph.D. and is now employed by Pioneer Natural Resources. Caitlin reports that she is very much enjoying her new job and is quickly gaining competence in geosteering.

During Fall 2017, I was joined by two new M.S. students. Elisabeth Rau received her B.S. from Colorado State University, and Anna Thorson received her B.S. from the University of the South (Sewanee). Elisabeth was on the Colorado State golf team, and Anna on the Sewanee swim team. Their athleticism translates to high energy and a flurry of activity in my workroom! Because Anna and Elisabeth keep things very lively and upbeat, I refer to them as the GoGos. My third new student is Bart Yeates (Ph.D. candidate) who received his B.S. degree from Brigham Young

University - Provo, and his M.S. from Baylor working on the Devonian Marcellus Shale with Steve Dworkin. I got to know Bart well while he was working with Steve Dworkin, particularly since I was the second reader on his M.S. thesis. Bart is always smiling and happy (rain or shine) and can be counted on to complete a task. I greatly appreciate Bart’s reliability and positive energy.

All three of my new students are working on a multi-faceted study of the Late Devonian Duvernay Formation within the Alberta Basin. Anna’s thesis will address the regional sequence stratigraphy, Elisabeth’s the utility of digital well logs in predicting rock properties via “machine learning”, and Bart’s dissertation will address the basinwide elemental and organic geochemistry and their utility in chemostratigraphic correlation and reconstruction of paleoceangraphic conditions during deposition.

A minimester in the fieldOnce again, I enjoyed teaching my Advanced Field Sequence Stratigraphy course in the Summer 2018 minimester. We had a particularly lively and motivated group of 5 students this year: the GoGos, Jacob Jarvis, Erin Noonan, Kent Ostman, and Bart Yeates as TA. We enjoyed the best weather I’ve ever experienced. No gnats, not one day of rain, and daytime high temperatures typically in the 80s. As usual, the camp cuisine was outstanding, and for dessert on our last camping night at Green River, Utah we enjoyed grilled Twinkies. I was first introduced to grilled Twinkies by former Ph.D.

student Holly Meier during Summer 2008. Grilling causes Twinkies to experience an amazing transformation in texture and taste. Anna Thorson appropriately renamed them Crème’ BruTwinkies.

On the personal frontMy wife, Janelle and daughters Dallas and Audra are doing well. Janelle still works as the Geosciences accountant, and the girls are progressing well with their college studies.

Once again, please do stop by for a visit whenever you're passing through Waco. ▲

In addition to my duties as Chair of the Department of Geosciences, I continue to be fully engaged in both undergraduate and graduate teaching, and graduate student recruitment and advisement.

Chair and Professor of Petroleum and

Stratigraphy


Top: Graduate students Bart Yeates, Anna Thorson, and Elisabeth Rau in Banff Alberta Canada

Middle left: Elisabeth Rau, Anna Thorson, and yours truly getting our hands (and faces) dirty at Jura Creek, Albert

Middle right: Erin Noonan and Anna Thorson at the top of Slaughter Canyon, Guadalupe Mountains, New Mexico

Bottom left: Anna Thorson and Bart Yeates examining the Navajo Sandstone at Aztec Butte, Canyonlands, Utah

Bottom right: Erin Noonan, Elisabeth Rau, Jacob Jarvis, and Bart Yeates at Grand View Overlook, Canyonlands, Utah

PHOTO BY WARREN WONGNEWSLETTER FALL 2018 10

Dr. Kenny BefusIn honor of the many airplane miles I racked up this year traveling for research (and a bit for pleasure), here's an interview to introduce my students—in the style of an airline's seatback magazine.

Assistant Professor of Mineralogy & Petrology

Roy BassooWhat's your role here at Baylor?I'm a first year PhD student, new to the US and to Baylor.

Where were you before coming here?

I was a consulting geologist for a few years, working for a number of exploration companies looking to develop gold, uranium, and iron ore deposits. My travels have taken me from the frigid frontiers of the Arctic Circle to deep within the heart of the Amazonian and West African rainforests. I knew I wanted to complete a PhD some day and contribute to the field at a professional level. I found some time to do an MSc using data I acquired while working, which laid the foundation for completing a PhD. Eventually, through a series of chance encounters, I found myself here at Baylor, and with an opportunity to pursue my own research interests. I'm both humbled and grateful for the opportunity.

What type of geology samples does your research focus upon?

I study the origin of diamonds, specifically in Guyana. For years, people have thought these diamonds might be locally derived from sedimentary rocks, a paleo placer from the Paleoproterozoic, or weathered from kimberlite pipes in West Africa on to the South American coast. But then recently, diamondiferous lamprophyre dykes, which bring the diamonds to the earth’s surface, were discovered in Venezuela. This opened up yet another possible source. The debate is still open, and I hope to contribute to the conversation.

I see. Why are diamonds so important?

Apart from being beautiful, diamonds are vessels from another world, one deep beneath our feet. As diamonds grow in the Earth's mantle, they entrap other minerals as well. Because diamonds are exceptionally resistive to weathering, they preserve these stowaways, which can tell us much about the chemistry of the mantle. Since we can't reach the mantle by conventional means, diamonds and the inclusions they contain give us a rare glimpse into another dimension.

Tyler LeggettTell us what you do.

I'm a first year Master’s student, and I was a Baylor Geology undergrad. I'm using a drone to understand lava flows.

A drone pilot for volcanoes? Interesting.

Yes, I grew up playing video games, so flying a drone came second nature. That being said, it's not all fun and games. You have to constantly monitor the battery life, wireless connection to the drone, and environmental surroundings. Or you run the risk of losing or crashing an expensive piece of equipment into trees or other structures around you. But the benefits outweigh the risks, as drones let us cover a lot of ground and reproduce the terrain with an incredibly high-resolution map—without having to burden your legs.

That's an interesting skill set, especially applied to volcanoes. What's next for you after finishing your MS?

I see two paths. One, I use my skills in geology, drone piloting, and mapping for a career in

industry, with the intent of getting my PhD later. Two, I get a PhD straight away, with the intent of working for NASA or SpaceX to analyze the geology of celestial bodies. Rachel BruyereHi there, undergraduate research assistant. You're up.

Cool, but my time here is almost done. I'm a graduating senior undergrad.

Then you're probably tired of this next question. What's next for you?

Baylor Geosciences has prepared me to pursue a PhD at Arizona State—both academically and through the tortuous process of grad school applications. My dreams have been encouraged and nurtured while still being challenged to pursue even higher standards.

You presented significant research in many formats this year. What advice do you have for others about research?

Do it! Undergraduate research has been one of the most challenging and yet rewarding pieces of my Baylor journey. I've been stretched in ways I didn't expect and learned a whole host of skills, which will be beneficial for me in my future career in geoscience. Besides, getting out into the field and SEEING things with your own eyes is much more rewarding than merely learning about it in a lecture or paper. ▲


Meet the PhantomWe're thankful to Kim and Bill Johnson of

Dallas Aerial Surveys for the gifts to purchase this drone and the opportunity to build our new

Geospatial Visualization Lab.

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Dr. Rena Bonem

This is a year of transitions for me. First, I retired at the end of May. It was great to see the former students and friends who made it back for the departmental receptions. I think Susie Cochran came from the greatest distance (California), but it was wonderful to see so many familiar faces! Among those I remember, were Susie and Candice, Chris Goss, Nick Pieracocos, Adam Damman, Joe Whiteside, Don Parker, Dorcas Beaver, and Cindy Cronin.

A week earlier, I was in Jamaica to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory and the marine science program at the University of the West Indies. The festivities included presentations in Kingston, which we drove to from the north coast on a new road that cuts across the island in 45 minutes (and exposes the geology of the island). The final banquet lasted almost three hours, with special presentations to former lab directors from Jeremy Woodly and Ian Sandiman and long-term lab employees

like Peter Gayle, who now helps administer the lab. Some of the folks who had been at the lab in 1974 when I first visited were there, including Judy Lang and Phil Dustin. And Peter Goreau was there representing the Goreau family, who established the lab.

My project for the coming year is to scan all the student papers and thesis that have been done at the lab as well as all of the photographs that go back to the 1970’s for baseline data on Jamaican reefs. I have a rostroconch paper to finish as well as an edrioasteroid paper that was never completed. I have all the data, just need to get it written and submitted.

This fall, I will teach Invertebrate Paleontology for the last time to let my replacement, Elizabeth Petsios, have a sabbatical semester before she starts teaching. If any of you visit in the fall, I've moved into the office next door, thanks to Vince Cronin who cleared out his real office. ▲

It's been a year of transitions for me, as I retired at the end of May. Now, I turn to teaching a final class and finishing up a couple of papers.


In honor of Professor Bonem's 38 years of service to Baylor, I thought I'd share a few of her achievements (at least the ones that I'm aware of). I can't say I know all of them, because Rena is a humble person. In fact, the consistent example of her humility and integrity is one of her enduring gifts to us all.

Rena was the first person in our department to be elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She didn't seek this honor for herself, but was nominated for that distinction by fellow scientists outside Baylor who recognized her extraordinary contributions to our scientific community.

She was also elected Fellow of the Geological Society of America and a Fellow of Sigma Xi and inducted into the Women Divers Hall of Fame in 2001. In addition to those organizations, Dr. Bonem is (or has been) a member of many others: International Association of Reef Studies, Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, Sigma Gamma Epsilon (National Geology Honor Society), International Paleontological Association, American Association of Petroleum Geologists, and American Academy of Underwater Sciences.

Dr. Bonem has held many positions at the Geological Society of America, including being elected and serving as a GSA Councilor, a member of both the Strategic and Long-Range Planning Committees, and all leadership positions in the South Central Section of GSA. She also served on the GSA Foundation Development Board. Dr. Bonem has also held a number of important positions in the Paleontological Society, chairing the Nominating Committee, serving on the Schuchert Medal Committee, and reviewing for the Journal of Paleontology.

In a department populated with more than a few stratigraphers, Dr. Bonem's knowledge of the paleontology and stratigraphy of the sedimentary section in Central Texas and Oklahoma is unsurpassed. She shared that knowledge through classes, by advising many undergraduate and graduate these and dissertations, and through field trips. She also served as an expert resource for many people, from professional geoscientists to folks who

think they have found a meteorite, a dinosaur bone, or human footprints in the Cretaceous limestone.

On the side, Rena has been a Y-SCUBA Gold-Star Instructor who enabled a generation of folks to experience coral reefs and other marine wonders first-hand. Her 45 years of collaboration with the Discovery Bay Marine Research Lab in Jamaica was recognized in May when the lab honored her contributions at their 50th Anniversary celebration in Jamaica. And then there is her significant involvement with both the Waco Agility Group and various Dachshund Rescue groups. In these, as in most other things of importance to Rena, she has not been merely a participant, but has been an essential leader.

Dr. Bonem has shown us what it means to bring dignity and honor to the task of being a university professor. She was nominated at least twice in recent years for an Outstanding Faculty Award, in recognition of her outstanding contributions as a professor. In truth, she could have (and should have) been nominated every year.

Dr. Bonem is the one who meets with families of prospective students and takes calls from worried parents to calm their nerves and find solutions to tough problems. For many years, she has done undergraduate advising for Geology, Geography, Geophysics, and Earth Science majors and minors.

More importantly, Rena demonstrates extraordinary care, concern, kindness, empathy, and respect for students. Her nurturing mentorship, as well as her sharing of hard truths about what it takes to succeed, has allowed our students to not only survive but to thrive as novice geoscientists. Her positive effect on them and their careers has been plain to see.

I am deeply grateful for Rena's friendship, and for all of her many essential contributions to this community, the greatest of which is her example to us all. ▲

Left top: University retirement recep-tion with the President of Baylor,

Dr. Linda Livingstone.

Left bottom: Dr. Bonem in Jamaica to celebrate the 50th anniversary of

the Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory.

Below: Dr. Stacy Atchley presents Dr. Bonem a plaque recognizing her years of service to the department.

PHOTO BY WARREN WONG14


A brief history of

RenaBy Dr. Vince Cronin


entitled "Geoethics: Taking a Stand for Ethical Geoscience Research, Education, Communica-tion, and Practice."

Summit in SwedenI am a (minor) member of the organizing committee for the first Geoscience & Society Summit being organized by the American Geophysical Union, the Geological Society of London, GSA, IAPG, and others. This inaugural meeting had been scheduled to occur in Sep-tember 2018 in Bermuda. However, recent ac-tions by the government of Bermuda have had the effect of discriminating against the LGBTQ community, making it impossible to hold the meeting in Bermuda given non-discrimination policies of AGU and other sponsors. We are now re-organizing the meeting to occur in Stockholm, Sweden, 18-21 March 2018 (connect.agu.org/gss).

Upcoming projectsDuring the summer of 2019, I hope to finish years of work by various students (Lindsay, Reed, Ashburn, Strasser) along the trend of the Dog Valley Fault near Truckee, California. Perhaps with help from John Dunbar and new MS student Ben Sadler, we hope to conduct geophysical surveys meant to test hypoth-eses for the location of the fault.

I'm also gearing-up to edit the 12th edition of the AGI/NAGT Laboratory Manual in Physical Geology, which should be in print in January 2020. In other words, my answer to almost any question about whether I can do X or Y between September 2018 and early December 2019 will most likely be "No, but thank you for asking." Time is not elastic, and the revision process for a 400-page lab manual is an intel-lectual marathon.

On the family frontElsewhere in the news, our son, Connor, graduated with a BS degree in mechanical en-gineering at the University of Portland in May 2018, finishing his degree in four years. So now Cindy and I are officially "empty nesters," with Connor living in Oregon and Kelly in Chicago. That is, if you can consider our nest "empty" when we have a very intelligent tuxedo cat, a 95-pound Labrador-retriever mix, a husky-border collie mix, and a catahoula. The house still seems full. ▲

Geoethics guidelinesWith help from colleagues, I proposed that our Geosciences Department adopt the newly published ethics guidelines of the American Geophysical Union (ethics.agu.org/files/2013/03/Scientific-Integrity-and-Profes-sional-Ethics.pdf) and created a draft ethics webpage for the department (croninprojects.org/Draft-GeoEthics-Page.html). As a result of this work, Billy Williams, Vice President for Eth-ics, Diversity and Inclusion at AGU, asked me to make a presentation at the AGU Heads and Chairs Workshop in New Orleans in Decem-ber 2017 to talk about how to encourage the development of an ethical environment in a geoscience department. Subsequently, the Jackson School of Geosciences at University of Texas at Austin posted its own web pages about ethics, and require students to endorse their ethical guidelines (www.jsg.utexas.edu/people/jsg-community/guidelines).

The International Association for Promoting Geoethics (IAPG, www.geoethics.org) asked me to expand on my ethics presentation at the European Geoscience Union meeting in Vienna in mid-April 2018 (croninprojects.org/Ethics-EGU2018), where I also made an invited presentation about retaliation in a panel on "Seeking engagement and input on harass-ment and workplace climate issues within the geoscience community" (croninprojects.org/Retaliation-EGU2018/index.htm).

The American Geosciences Institute also recently adopted a "statement on harass-ment in the Geosciences," to which I con-tributed from outside the writing committee (www.americangeosciences.org/content/agi-statement-harassment-geosciences), and the

National Academies will soon release the final version of "Sexual Harassment of Women—Cli-mate, Culture, and Consequences in Academic Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine " (www.nap.edu/catalog/24994/sexual-harassment-of-women-climate-culture-and-consequences-in-academic). The Geological Society of America is currently engaged in an extensive revision of its ethics and harassment policies, which should be published in the next year. These developments are certainly hopeful.

Visiting MauthausenWhile at EGU, I traveled out to the Mauthau-sen Memorial near Linz, Austria. For seven years from 1938-1945, Mauthausen was a class 3 concentration camp and the center of a group of almost 100 subcamps near Vienna where persons who were Jewish, Slavic, politi-cal prisoners, POWs from Russia and Poland, homosexual, and other enemies of the National Socialists were sent to be murdered. The prisoners were intentionally worked to death in the granite quarries at Mauthausen and Gusen and in building the Bergkristall tun-nel system where German aircraft and arma-ments were manufactured. The fundamental idea that enabled these camps is that some people are intrinsically untermenschen (sub-human) because of accidents of birth about which they have no control, whereas others are übermenschen with the right to use or murder untermenschen as they pleased. The opposite view is expressed in the first line of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaimed just three years after the libera-tion of Mauthausen and the fall of the Nazis: "recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of free-

dom, justice, and peace in the world..." (www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/index.html). There are no untermenschen, no übermenschen; just us, in all our diversity.

Symposium in VancouverAs I write this in mid-June 2018, Cindy and I will be leaving in a few days to participate in several ethics symposia at the Resources for Future Generations meeting in Vancouver, Canada. I was an organizer of these sessions along with colleagues from the IAPG, and will be presenting a keynote (croninprojects.org/Ethics-RFG2018) and a shorter contribu-tion (http://croninprojects.org/Ethics-RFG2018/GeoEthics-Across-Property-Lines) in addition to chairing a session and being an IAPG repre-sentative on a geoethics panel. The beginning of the keynote reflects my attempt to derive meaning from my trip to Mauthausen, through my later study about human dignity and the unethical exercise of power. When that meet-ing wraps, we will fly to Paris (not the one in Texas) to take part in the "50 Years of Plate Tectonics" symposium organized by Eric Calais at the College de France. Richard Gordon from Rice University will also be contributing to that symposium. Gordon and I are planning to join with Phil Resor (Wesleyan University) and Josh Davis (Carleton College) to create a primer on plate kinematics for Cambridge University Press in the next few years.

Session at AGUCindy Palinkas of the University of Maryland and I are convening a geoethics session at the AGU meeting in Washington, DC, in De-cember 2018. Cindy and I are the co-heads of the IAPG in the United States. Our session is

Dr. Vince CroninI've spent considerable time this past year contributing to geoethics guidelines and giving presentations across Baylor and beyond. Here are some of the highlights.

Professor of Structure &

Neotectonics


PHOTO BY JUSTIN LEUBKE 16NEWSLETTER FALL 201815 16

Teaching updatesIn fall 2017, I co-taught (with Bill Hockaday) two sections of GEO 5V90 Seminar in Grant Proposal-Writing, which we opened to grads from other STEM departments. We focused on submitting to the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program. In spring 2018, I taught GEO 5339 Sandstone Petrology. I also continued to serve as Associate Dean for Research in the Graduate School, which has been very interesting work. One of my main assignments is to oversee English language instruction for international ESL graduate students. I'm also trying to enhance faculty awards across campus, and, in fall 2018, will oversee a pilot launch to do external evaluations of Baylor PhD programs.

This summer, I also taught a 3-day short course on soil/paleosol micromorphology for faculty and students at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. Pictured to the right are Paula Perilla, Leah Wenhold, Richie Ness, Sam Gwizd, Jason Muhlbauer & Larry McKay (all in EPS), as well as Bridgette Fritz, Matt Boehm & Sally Horn (all in Geography).

Student updatesThis was the year of my continued direction of 4 PhD dissertations. Bill Lukens defended his dissertation in fall 2017, and after a one-semester post-doc with Lee Nordt here at Baylor, is headed to the University of Louisiana-Lafayette to begin a 1.5-year post-doc. Logan Wiest just defended his dissertation in May 2018 and in August will start a 1-year post-doc with Steve Forman here at Baylor. Current Ph.D. student Lyndsay DiPietro has just published her second paper on the Serpentine-Hot Springs site, Alaska site in Catena, and

she is on target to defend her dissertation in September 2018. Yohan Letourmy’s research continues at the UNESCO World Heritage site at Joggins, Nova Scotia, famous for its very large Pennsylvanian fossil trees buried in growth position by fluvial sandstone deposits. He is currently preparing a manuscript for the Journal of Sedimentary Research on the sequence stratigraphy and statistical analysis of periodicity of 1,000 m of fluvial and paleosol strata. Former PhD student Emily Beverly (co-advised with Dan Peppe) just accepted a tenure-track position at the University of Houston, which starts in August of 2018. Former PhD student Lauren Michel continues in a tenure-track Assistant Professor appointment at Tennessee Tech University, and former PhD student Gary Stinchcomb continues in a tenure-track Assistant Professor appointment at Murray State University, KY. New PhD student Sarah Kogler arrived in Waco in July 2018, having recently completed her MS at Ohio University, and will research paleosols and modern soil analog systems.

Committees and talksIn summer 2017, I served as a member of a “Committee of Visitors” tasked with reviewing the Earth Sciences Programs of the Geosciences Directorate of NSF, and made a visit to Arlington, VA in June for a panel meeting. In December 2017, I visited Texas A & M University’s Department of Geology and Geophysics to present an invited talk, and in January 2018, I presented an invited talk at LSU in Baton Rouge. I continue to study a petroleum reservoir in paleoweathered granite basement that produces oil in the Norwegian North Sea basin with Lars Riber at the University of

Oslo. I continue collaborations with Estonian colleagues Professor Kalle Kirsimäe and Dr. Peeter Somelar on the Neoproterozoic “Baltic paleosol” interpreted as a paleo-Oxisol and published a paper with them in Precambrian Research in 2018. My own research continues to focus on interdisciplinary paleoclimate and paleolandscape reconstructions using fossil soils, or paleosols, as well as conducting studies of modern soil systems (especially Vertisols) to develop climate proxies and analogs of ancient soils. In 2017-2018, I published 18 refereed journal articles, two as first author. I also made 4 professional presentations of my research (as first author) and was a co-author on 15 others.

On a personal noteIn summer 2017, Marylaine and I traveled to Knoxville, TN, our summer retreat from the Texas heat, plus a holiday gathering place with family. We vacationed in Colonial Williamsburg and along the Delmarva Peninsula. Marylaine and I continue to enjoy the vibrancy of living in our downtown Waco condo. We really like being about to walk or bike to everything. Marylaine continues with her part-time job as archivist for McLennan Community College and has become active politically in McLennan County. Our daughter, Mary Catherine, is getting a PhD in medical anthropology from Arizona State University. She's in Guatemala for 6 months of research, and we plan to visit her in August. Our oldest son Nathan is happily teaching Philosophy at Pellissippi State Community College in Knoxville, TN and has become our live-in “caretaker” for our second home. Our other son Trevor also lives in Knoxville and works for a mortgage company. Marylaine and I plan to continue to make frequent trips back to the southeast to visit family and friends. ▲

Dr. Steve DrieseIt has been another busy year for me with teaching, research, and professional service. Here are highlights of what my students and I have been up to.

Professor of Paleopedology & Sedimentology


NEWSLETTER FALL 2018 18NEWSLETTER FALL 201817


Student updatesIn 2018, graduate student Bulbul Ahmmed, who I co-advise with Scott James, contin-ued his work on the electrical and hydraulic properties of fractured rock. For the second summer in a row, Bulbul received a summer internship at Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, NM. There, he works on numerical models of the electrical response of fractured rock. John also worked on projects with Jay Pulliam’s students, Alden Netto and Joseph Thangraj. Alden used simulated-annealing inversion of gravity data to produce an average crustal density map for the Gulf Coast and adjacent regions. Joseph is doing a geodynamic modeling study of the tectonic evolution of passive continental margins after the onset of seafloor spreading.

Key projectsIn addition to working with graduate students, I continued work with Peter Allen and Joseph White on stream hydraulics. In 2017-2018, we completed field projects on Denton Creek, in the DFW area and the Blanco River, near San Marcos. I've also continued working on my 3D fluid dynamics model, which simulates turbulent flow in open channels. The model now runs on workstations with multi-GPU co-processors and computes turbulent stress on channel banks and bottoms. The next step is to apply the model to simulations of real-world streams, based on input from drone-based aerial photography.

Also in 2018, I contributed to a pilot project in the Waco Mammoth National Monument with Lee Nordt and his graduate student, Rebecca Taormina. The goal was to collect initial data to support a NFS proposal to develop a paleogeographic reconstruction of

the site. For my part, I worked with John Will of Baylor’s Center for Spatial Research and students Bulbul Ahmmed, Alden Netto, Joseph Thangraj, Kent Ostman, and Kang Vo to collect two electrical resistivity profiles across the site (see photo). The resistivity profiles were then compared to Geoprobe coring by Lee and Rebecca. Based on these data, they plan to propose collecting a grid of electrical resistivity profiles spaced 50m apart over the site and then to core anoma-lous features on the resulting profiles. The combination of resistivity and coring data will be used to map the paleo-tributary channel of the Brazos River, in which the mammoth remains were found.

On the home frontIn August 2017, our daughter, Tamura, gradu-ated with an MS in wetland ecology from Baylor (below), supervised by Joseph White.She now works for Horizon Environmental

Services Inc. in Austin, Texas. Her specialties are wetland delineation and Golden Cheek Warbler habit evaluation. My wife Anna still loves working for the City of Waco, where she is the Environmental Projects Manager, divid-ing her time between the recycling and storm water management programs. ▲

Dr. John DunbarAnother year working with talented students and colleagues on projects to better understand local rivers and map the remains of a woolly mammoth.

Professor of Near-Surface

Geophysical Methods

Above: John collects two electrical resistivity profiles in the Waco National Monument.

Below: John and Anna at their daughter Tamura's graduation from Baylor in August 2017

Associate Professor of Geophysics


NEWSLETTER FALL 2018 20PHOTO BY ANDREAS DRESS

Student updatesThis past Spring Break, I travelled with Stacy Atchley and 3 of our graduate students to describe and sample core from the Duver-nay Formation. I have two master’s students working on this project: Marylin Wisler will be working on the core while Kent Ostman will be working on outcrop samples. Both students will be generating the chemostratigraphic frame-work of the Duvernay that will lend insight into the evolving paleoceanographic conditions and nutrient dynamics of the Calgary basin during the late Devonian.

Two of my students, Bart Yeates and Jared Hanson, finished their master’s project on the geochemistry of the Marcellus Formation. My Ph.D. student Cong Jin has published his first paper and is now writing up the remainder of his dissertation, which involves the isotope geochemistry of organic matter in petrified wood as well as the isotope chemistry of clay minerals in paleosols. I have a new master’s student, Katarena Shiner, who is working on the influence of climate on Mayan agriculture in Belize. She is in Belize right now describing and collecting soil samples.

Research and teachingI have been working on quantifying paleosol mineral assemblages in Late Triassic paleosols, and I think this method will yield a novel tool for reconstructing the evolution of paleoclimates. The lab work is tedious and involved but the results are promising, and I will continue to generate X-ray diffraction patterns for the

rest of the summer. Our X-ray lab continues to churn out lots of data with quite a few stu-dents using the fluorescence instrument and the diffractometer.

This upcoming semester, I'm taking over the position of Undergraduate Program Director from Rena Bonem. As most of you know, Rena retired last semester after a long and success-ful career, and I will try to advise undergradu-ates as well as she did. However, I am just beginning to understand how much work Rena devoted to this job, so I expect to have a busy upcoming semester.

Field camp went well this past summer. I still enjoy sleeping in a tent and eating out of a cooler. We had to come home a few days early because the San Juan forest was closed due to wildfires. My other teaching duties include Earthquakes and Natural Disasters, Mineralogy, Sedimentary Petrology, Isotope Geochemistry and Aqueous Geochemistry.

Family mattersSandy and I are doing well, and we are getting ready to head off on our summer trip to Colo-rado. My big fixer upper project this year was building an enormous retaining wall to house a pad for our RV—perhaps lifting all those concrete blocks is the reason my shoulder now hurts. ▲

Dr. Steve DworkinAnother productive year filled with research, teaching, and field camp—despite part of it being foiled by wildfires.

Professor of Geochemistry &

Sedimentary PetrologyBelow: Day 1 of Field Camp in summer 2018. Everyone is still enthusiastic on the hike up Slaughter Canyon in New Mexico. For more pics of field camp, see page 48.


NEWSLETTER FALL 201821 NEWSLETTER FALL 2018 22

Geoprobe, which can take 10-20 m long and continuous cores from most dune surfaces. Logan Wiest, who just completed his PhD, has mastered the use of the Geoprobe, through a bit of trial and error, and has been instrumental in extracting 25 cores from the Monahans and 7 cores from the Red River dunes. Zequn Wu, a new PhD student, will base her research off these and more cores to better understanding the interactions of Red River fluvial and eolian systems with late Holocene climate variability. She brings abilities in geospatial science and has been instrumental in using the soil map database to better quantify the limits of eolian and fluvial deposits.

The trio of Logan Wiest as a post-doctoral research scientist, and Tori Tew and Connor Mayhack will be analyzing and modeling the Quaternary eolian basin architecture near Monahans, TX using information from 25 Geoprobe cores and over 100 borings, with recovery length between 3 and 40 m. Baylor has unique capabilities in analyzing cores with an abundance of well-equipped laboratories for particle size analysis, environmental mag-netics, stable isotopes, biomarkers, molecular stratigraphy, grain-mineralogy, radiocarbon sample preparation and luminescence dating. The timeline to discoveries is significantly shortened compared to other programs be-cause of the depth and breadth of analytical facilities.

GeovisualizationRecently, with a generous donation to the de-partment, our capabilities for geovisualization and 3D modeling have improved significantly. We recognized that several faculty (Jay Pul-

liam, Peter James, Kenny Befus, and Steve Forman) had pressing research needs for new field visualization technology, dedicated work stations, and the needed computational re-sources for our bevy of post-doctoral research scientists, visitors, graduate, and undergradu-ate students. This group has identified as a core intellectual need the use of drone technology to secure high-resolution images of planetary processes, advanced kinematic GPS for precision mapping, high-resolution 3D immersion display of complex data sets, and the flexibility of high-end workstations to pro-cess an infinite variety of planetary geophysi-cal data sets. Mysterious mammothsOur interests have taken a turn toward paleontology with Don Esker’s entry into the group. Don has encyclopedic knowledge in Quaternary paleontology and clear excite-ment for vanished species. He is investigating truly fascinating topics associated with the Waco Mammoth National Monument. Don is trying to elucidate the migration pathways of mammoths just prior to their demise by mea-suring Sr isotopes from Mammoth teeth. His research is important to test the hypothesis if a megadrought caused the death of the Waco herd.

Don is spending part of the summer as a field archeologist/paleontologist at Hall’s Cave, near Kerrville, TX digging with a crew from Texas A&M University. Hall’s Cave is one of the hidden gems on the Texas landscape which contains a nearly continuous record of Pleistocene mammals, big and small, and is an important “laboratory” for further evaluating early human occupation. Don is the go-to-guy

for bone identification and is tagging teeth of larger mammals (bison) for Sr and O isotopes to discern where these animals came before their demise in or near Hall’s Cave.

Visitors from ChinaWe have been fortunate to host many talented scientists from China the past year, including Dr. Yougui Song and Dr. Shengli Yang, who are well-known scholars studying the unparalleled loess record in China.

A valuable addition as a graduate student is Liang Peng, who has received a scholarship for two years to study in the Geolumines-cence Dating Research Laboratory as a joint degree effort with the Institute of Geology and Geophysics in Beijing. Liang is a quick study, well versed in eolian processes and computational approaches. He has extensive field experience in the many active and sta-bilized dune fields that span northern China. Liang brings new perspectives, approaches, and ideas on the environmental sensitivity of dune systems to climate change. ▲

Our missionA touchstone of our research group is embracing new ideas, concepts, analytical and numeric approaches and technology that challenge existing scientific dogma that often impeded the advancement of science.

We are a group of scientists who are constantly learning from the faculty, post-doctoral scholars and students at Baylor; and with our valued collaborators just down the road at Texas A & M, University of Texas, Rice University and University of Houston and other research groups internationally. We value being part of an international research community where pluralism is respected and nurtured. All independent, heretical and critical thinking researchers and students are welcome.

We believe that this ever-changing matrix of collaborations that spans the geosciences and biogeochemistry underscores the value of diverse ideas, perspectives, and expertise; and is a stimulating approach to prepare the next generation of scientists to face chal-lenges in the energy sector, stewardship of the planet, and to insure the well-being of future generations. We welcome visitors from alumna to potential students. We all have something to learn. ▲

New research connectionsThis year, we've deepened our joint research with Mark Sweeney (University of S. Dakota) and Eric McDonald (Desert Research Insti-tute). Together, we're better quantifying the potential dust sources on the Great Plains during the 1930s Dust Bowl Drought. Over the past year PhD student Kasey Bolles has led the charge to quantify dust emissivity from a variety of soil-mapped surfaces in agricul-tural fields and abundant stabilized dune systems. Kasey has developed a novel way to analyze 1930s imagery to extract new insights on landscape denudation and dust emis-sivity during this historic megadrought. Her research is deemed so significantly important that she has landed a competitive post-doc-toral research position (2 years) in the drought group at Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University as she steps off the dais with PhD in hand.

Dust and droughtHaving too much dust and sand on one’s brain has led us to wonder if there were signif-icant differences in dust production between 95-100% quartz dunes for the Monahans, west Texas and the similarly pure gypsum dunes at White Sands National Monument in southern New Mexico. So, in collaboration with Dave Bustos at White Sands, Mark Sweeney drove down from South Dakota with his por-table circular wind “tunnel” and spent three days taking measurements. To our surprise, gypsum dunes are 10 to 200 times more of a dust source than quartz dunes and are a continental dust hot spot. Why do we care about dust so much? Because as the planet warms from anthropogenic-caused climate change, large areas of US will become much

hotter and drier and an increasing source of dust. Dust is a health exacerbator and leads to heightened morbidity and mortality from cardio-pulmonary diseases. To this end, Kasey and I recently ventured to National Jewish Health and the School of Public Health at University of Colorado-Denver to link directly a dust emissive model to statistical formulations on potential health outcomes.

Our fascination with dust extends back to the Quaternary with research on eolian systems associated with the Pecos River in west Texas and the Red River, which straddles the Texas and Oklahoma border. In this context, we are fortunate to have access to the Department’s

Dr. Steve FormanA year of research surprises, expanding collaborations, and loads of dust and sand on the brain.

Professor of Paleoclimate &

Geohydrology Tectonics


2423 NEWSLETTER FALL 2018

ResearchIn June, I took two research trips. First, I joined the Baylor in Italy archaeology study abroad group. They were excavating Etruscan Tombs and a Medieval structure near the town of Barbarano Roman, about an hour north of Rome. The tombs are carved into Late Pleistocene tuff deposited as pyroclastic flows from the eruption of Mount Vico, which left behind the caldera that now includes Lake Vico and the surrounding beech forest and agricultural fields. I'm starting a collaboration with Laura Sadori of Sapienza Universita di Roma to study the climate history of the region near the archaeological site during the Holocene. We plan to use the carbon and hydrogen isotopic composition of plant leaf waxes in the sediments of Lake Vico to characterize variation in precipitation during the time that the archaeological site was occupied. While in Italy, I took side trips with my family to Gubbio, where we visited the outcrop where Iridium was first discovered at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, and Pompeii to see the ruins left behind by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 C.E. Later in the month, I also joined Stacy Atchley’s research group in Calgary for a week, analyzing Devonian cores and taking samples for organic geochemical analysis.

I’m looking forward to another productive year and continuing to teach and learn about the dynamic earth system. I'm teaching Global Biogeochemical Cycles in the fall and Geomicrobiology and World Oceans in the spring. With teaching, research, advising and service obligations, I expect to keep very busy during the coming year. ▲

Lab and student updateThe new Microbial Biogeochemistry Lab in the Department of Geosciences is now built, and we have microbial culture experiments started and a backlog of samples for pigment and lipid analysis. Already, we have produced data to support student and faculty presentations and funding proposals. And the lab is about to get even busier. In fall 2018, I will have two new graduate students: Sanjukta Dhar as a Ph.D. candidate and Mason Frucci as an M.S. Two undergraduate students work in the lab, Sarah Catherine Weaver as an undergraduate lab assistant and Arham Siddiqui conducting honors thesis research. I couldn’t be more excited to have all these students working on problems in geomicrobiology and biogeochemistry.

The main analytical instrumentation in the lab is a new Thermo Fisher LTQ linear ion trap mass spectrometer coupled to a Thermo Dionex high performance liquid chromatograph. We share this instrument with Dr. Thad Scott’s Limnology Lab (Biology) and use it to analyze intact polar lipids and pigments from plants, algae, and diverse microbes from environmental samples and lab cultures. We also analyze biomarkers such as chlorins, porphyrins, carotenoids, and steroids from lake and marine sediment and sedimentary rocks. The lab is fully equipped for sample extraction and preparation, with equipment including a freeze-dryer, centrifuge, evaporation station, combustion oven, and fume hoods. We have two incubators for microbial growth experiments.

Baylor also provided lab start-up funds to add a second isotope ratio mass spectrometer to the Stable Isotope Lab. This second Thermo Delta V IRMS has a gas chromatograph front end for analyzing compound-specific isotope ratios of carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen. These measurements are used in studies of paleoclimatology, geomicrobiology, ecology, and descriptions of past environments. This instrument will support high-level graduate research across our department, plus transdisciplinary research projects with faculty and graduate students in biology, environmental science, and other departments on campus and with collaborators at other universities.

Presentations and outreachIn fall 2017, I returned to my alma mater, Penn State, to give a talk at a research symposium in honor of retiring faculty members, including my PhD co-advisor, Mike Arthur. I also gave a presentation on aeolian transport of organic biomarkers of soil microbes at the AGU Fall Meeting in New Orleans. Outreach activities included helping with Earth Science Week at the Mayborn Museum and leading an activity on petroleum formation with fifth graders during Science Day at West Avenue Elementary School in Waco. In the spring, I taught a new graduate class on organic biomarkers in petroleum and a section of Earthquakes and Other Natural Disasters. I also participated in the Rising Stars program with the Vice Provost for Research and gave a public lecture titled “Looking for Life in All the Dry Places” in the Mayborn Museum Science Thursdays series.

Dr. Jamey FultonOur new Microbial Biogeochemistry Lab is fully stocked, staffed with student researchers, and producing data for presentations and proposals across Baylor.

Assistant Professor of Geomicrobiology

Top: Recent Geosciences graduate Marlee Haralson was part of the team on the San Giuliano Archaeological Project in Italy. Here, she sits on a throne carved from a tuff block.

Bottom: Family picture in front of Trevi Fountain in Rome. Pictured with me: Deirdre Fulton, Assistant Professor of Religion at Baylor, Jada (9) and Dane (6).

Left: PhD student Bart Yeates examines an outcrop of the Exshaw Formation in Alberta.




Teaching updateMy teaching responsibilities for the year include ten classes: eight in the fall and spring and another two in summer semesters. These are all freshman-level classes in Earth Science and World Geography. Baylor has experienced a series of “vision statements” over the past twenty years, each resulting in a curricular response. Currently, the College of Arts and Sciences is changing the core requirements of the bachelor’s degree, with impacts that will be experienced in the years to come.

“Illuminate” is the most recent strategic plan adopted by the Board of Regents from 2018 through 2022. Specifically, Baylor will evidence “high aspiration, distinctiveness, improvements to learning at the undergradu-ate and graduate levels, alignment with our Christian mission and deep impact in the world.” Institutional response to the plan will

increasingly place emphasis on research, but new course development will follow in support of this strategic plan. One of the five areas of emphasis includes a focus on Latin America. Although the timeline for completion of this strategic plan coincides with my retirement, I cannot help but wonder if one of the courses that fits this vision would be a course in the geography of Latin America. To that end, I'm interested in developing the Geography of Latin America as an online course available throughout the year.

Travels in summer 2018This year's field study took my wife Alison and I on a counter-clockwise circuit of the

Southwest, starting in Colorado through Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. The list of places along the way included Arches, Bryce, Zion and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. Often visited in past years, new discoveries were found in Zion as we entered through the northwest entrance. The most fascinating feature encountered was Antelope Canyon, Arizona. Located eight miles east of Page, Antelope Canyon was formed by erosion of Navajo Sandstone. The basin upstream from the outcrop collects monsoonal rains resulting in a flash flood that races through the narrow slot canyon. I’ve included here a few photos of places visited, memories of summer 2018. ▲

Dr. Don GreeneA year full of introductory classes in Earth Science and World Geography, plus field study and travel in the Southwest.

Professor of Meteorology & Geography

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28NEWSLETTER FALL 2018

Dr. Nathaniel Femi Adegboyega, postdoc (2015 – 2018). This fall, Nathaniel will take on the adventure of leading his own research lab and classroom teaching. He starts the next phase of his career as tenure-track Assistant Professor in Environmental Chemistry at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville.

Burke Leonce and Zhao (Amanda) Wang are new PhD students in their first and sec-ond years at Baylor, respectively. Both have their M.S. degrees and are already published authors. I look forward to the energy, ideas, and expertise they bring.

Recent graduatesCreighton Meyers (BS, 2014) completed an MS thesis in 2017 at University of Texas, San Antonio with Judy Haschenburger in fluvial geomorphology. Creighton is now a doctoral student at Texas A&M University in the Department of Ecosystem Science and Management, where he is studying with Dr. Srinivasan in the Geospatial Sciences Labora-tory. Creighton has received a prestigious scholarship from the Department of Defense, which will support both his doctoral and post-doctoral work.

Dr. Todd Longbottom, (PhD in Geology, 2017) has taken an important next step in his career and starts a postdoctoral research fellowship at Texas Christian University, in the school of Geology, Energy, and the Environment. Todd will work under the mentorship of Dr. Omar Harvey on a large research project that is funded by the Department of Energy. Todd and I are still writing papers together, based on the data he collected at Baylor. It will be wonderful to have Todd back in Texas!

The Hockaday family We’ve had an action-filled year of work and play. As Will and Abby get older, there are more soccer, gymnastics, and swimming practices to attend. And this year, Abby starts kindergarten (!). Mary continues to work as a fourth grade science and writing teacher at Robinson ISD. Somehow, she also finds the time and energy to play on two adult soccer teams. We've been blessed to spend our downtimes this year with our families in Ohio and Pennsylvania at the Christmas break and summer holiday. On spring break, we had a wonderful 3 days with friends in the Ozarks at Big Cedar Lodge. We are all looking forward to another great school year. ▲

Current studentsOwen Craven (M.S. Geology, May 2018)It seems too soon, but Owen has already finished a highly ambitious M.S. thesis and defended it with flying colors. Owen’s project entailed the design and construction of customized reaction chambers for performing subaqueous maturation experiments on pe-troleum source rocks and biofuel feedstocks. He successfully matured 6 different types of organic matter under a range of temperatures and pressures, producing a “library” of syn-thetic oils, bitumens, and kerogen samples, which he subsequently characterized by mo-lecular spectroscopy and mass spectrometry. We are preparing several research papers that provide great insight to the mechanisms of petroleum generation reactions. Owen has

moved to Fort Worth with his wife Marjorie, and son Calvin to work as a summer intern for Pioneer Natural Resources. I look forward, with great anticipation, to the bright future ahead of Owen.

Zachary Valdez (PhD candidate in Ecologi-cal, Earth, & Environmental Science)Zack has all but defended his dissertation and has moved to Washington D.C. to fulfil a year-long science policy immersion program on Capitol Hill. This opportunity was made possible by Congressional Science Fellowship awarded to Zack by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Zack has long had an interest in science policy, and hopefully this meaningful experience will lead to future career opportunities for Zack.

Michael Nguyen (PhD candidate in Geosci-ences) – Mike left Baylor several years ago with Professor Boris Lau to finish his dis-sertation research at UMASS Amherst, but I am fortunate to continue working with Mike as a member of his dissertation committee. Mike published an excellent paper this year in the European Journal of Soil Science, titled “Is the adsorption of soil organic matter to haematite temperature dependent?” Mike is scheduled to defend this dissertation in fall 2018. But more importantly, he has a job as full-time a faculty member (lecturer) with the Loyola University Arrupe College in Chicago. The Arrupe College has a profoundly unique and important mission as a private Christian college serving low-income, first-generation college students.

Dr. Bill HockadayI can't help but spend this year's newsletter bragging on the accomplishments of our current students and recent graduates.

Associate Professor of Organic Geochemistry &

Biogeochemistry

Below: The Hockaday family: Bill and Mary hold children Abby and Will.


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This was a transition year for me at Baylor University: while I officially started my faculty position here in August of last year, I took a leave of absence from the department in spring 2018 to visit the Lunar and Plan-etary Institute (LPI) in Houston. The LPI was founded by president Lyndon Johnson in 1968 to analyze the anticipated moon rock samples returned by the Apollo astronauts. Now, it's morphed into the leading global institution for the study of our solar system. My semester at the LPI was funded by the prestigious Urey Fellowship, named after the chemist and Nobel laureate Harold Urey. In my time at the LPI, I developed many professional relationships and collaborations that will con-tinue with my research efforts at Baylor. Now I'm back at Baylor and hope to remain here for the foreseeable future!

My first studentI recently started advising my first graduate student, Christopher Mitchell. He studies terrestrial impact craters for a Master’s thesis. Chris’s work will be facilitated by our newly acquired Scintrex CG-6 gravimeter, which can detect changes of the strength of Earth’s gravity as small as one part in a billion. Such changes happen when there is a concentration or deficit of mass un-derground. This instrument will be a fantastic new weapon in our department’s technologi-cal arsenal, with applications in hydrology, ex-ploration geophysics, and planetary science.

ResearchAs a pilot study, I joined colleagues from NASA JPL and LSU in performing a gravity survey of an unconfirmed impact crater in

Louisiana (see the pic to the right). This single-day survey resulted in two conference papers presented in March.

While these updates may paint me as a normal Earth-bound geophysicist, I remain actively—and primarily—a planetary scien-tist. I have served on several internal NASA panels since my hiring, and the majority of my research efforts are focused on studying the internal structure of planets and moons in the solar system. One of the highlights of my professional career came this year when I was honored with a group achievement award from NASA administrator Robert Lightfoot for my work on the MESSENGER project team.

TeachingThis fall, I'm teaching my first classes: Explora-tion Geophysics 1, and a graduate seminar in Planetary Seismology. The latter seminar will be particularly timely, with NASA’s InSight mission scheduled to land on Mars part-way through the semester. This mission will contain a seismometer and a heat flow probe, and it will produce data that is of interest to a couple of us here at Baylor.

Learn moreTo learn more about the fledgling Planetary Research Group, visit http://peterbjames.net

I also periodically tweet about research snippets and various science topics with my Twitter handle: @peterbjames ▲

Dr. Peter JamesI'm back in Baylor's orbit, fresh from a semester at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston. Now I'm taking on my first student and new classes—all while keeping an eye on NASA's InSight mission.

Assistant Professor of Geophysics & Planetary

Science

PHOTO BY DINO REICHMUTH

Aim for heaven, and you will get Earth thrown in.—C.S. Lewis

Above: Performing a gravity survey of an unconfirmed impact crater in Louisiana, along with colleagues from NASA and LSU.



Dr. Scott James

Colorado this year) where I serve as Shadow Committee Chair and Subject Matter Expert for the Global Marine Hydrokinetic Industry and am tasked with developing the interna-tional standard that will facilitate licensing of riverine hydrokinetic energy projects.

Hawaii, take twoLast October, I was fortunate to take a busi-ness trip to Oahu, Hawaii for the annual meet-ing of the International Electrotechnical Com-mission Technical Advisory Group, in which I participate on writing the international stan-dards for “Marine energy – Wave, tidal and other water current converters.” My wonderful girlfriend, Angie, was able to accompany me. She noted that it was the best vacation she had ever taken (even if I had to work for a few days). Given that rave review, I've planned a week vacation with her at Waikoloa Village on the Big Island of Hawaii, which we are looking forward to immensely. ▲

Deep learning in DublinLast year’s update was written while I was in Dublin on summer sabbatical at IBM Research. I recall this time with great fondness. During those 13 weeks, I immersed myself in deep-learning research, which is a major component of artificial intelligence. I find this area to be the most exciting thing I've worked on in my career. Stanford Professor Andre Ng says, “Deep learning is our generation’s electricity,” meaning that it will bring about sea changes in society on par with the introduction of electricity. At its heart, it is pattern recogni-tion where the nonlinear mapping of inputs to outputs is calculated. With the ever increas-ing computation power available, especially through graphical processor units or GPUs, and the advent of enormous data sets, this technology has come into its own. I expect the next few years will see more and faster changes in technology than have ever before been realized.

Teaching updateThis year I was able to teach two established classes, Applied Groundwater Modeling (graduate level) in the fall and Environmental Geology (freshman level) in the spring. With a Spring Research Leave approved for 2019 and a restructuring of Baylor’s core curricu-lum, spring 2018 was the last time I will teach Environmental Geology; it's being replaced by a Grand Challenge course. I will teach a gradu-ate Geostatistics course again in the Fall.

ConferencesI was fortunate to attend several conferences this academic year. In December, I attended my 23rd American Geophysical Union Fall

Meeting, where I chaired poster and oral ses-sions on Renewable Energy: Marine, Wave, and Hydrokinetic. I was excited to present ad-ditional marine renewable energy research at the OCEANS17 meetings in June in Aberdeen, Scotland and in September in Anchorage, Alaska. I was also able to present some deep-learning research at the AGU Ocean Sciences meeting in Portland, Oregon. After many years of being asked to present in my former advisor’s session at the European Geosci-ence Union General Assembly, I finally went to Vienna, Austria to present two posters at this conference in April.

Publications and journalsI continue to hold a courtesy appointment with the Department of Mechanical Engineer-ing so that I can publish papers in this field as well as in the geosciences. I published five papers related to topics in mechanical engineering. In the geosciences, I published two manuscripts. In relation to my research in renewable energy, I published a journal article and a conference paper. As a result of my summer sabbatical, I published a couple of manuscripts where we developed a machine-learning surrogate model to forecast ocean-wave conditions, a conference paper, and had four poster presentations. Currently, I have several other manuscripts in peer review and under development.

Student updatesThis year I had the pleasure of working with two undergraduate researchers: Jon Johnston and Scott Fitzgerald. They have been helping me simulate river hydrokinetic energy turbines in the Tanana River in Alaska (funded by Sandia National Laboratories)

as well as modeling the fate and transport of contaminants at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Simi Valley, California (funded by the Department of Energy). My doctoral student, Jiajun “Dylan” Jiang continues his research developing a modeling framework for multiphase, multicomponent thermochemi-cally enhance oil recovery. He is also getting involved with deep learning approaches to identify faults and facies from geophysical data. Katherine Breen, my second-year doctoral student who is finishing her first year with me, is using deep learning to estimate soil moisture throughout the nation for use in crop-viability and flood-risk assessments. I also co-advise two other doctoral students: Bulbul Ahmmed with Dr. John Dunbar and William Brewer with my mentor Dr. Yelder-man. Starting this fall, I will advise an incoming master’s student, Toluwani Soares, who will be working on a newly funded project through the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) where we are simulating macroalgae (kelp) biomass production for use as a biofuel. The weekly James Research Group meetings are enormously enjoyable for me. These are ses-sions where my students present the latest developments and breakthroughs in their research. As you can imagine, working with four graduate students and two undergrads keeps me on my toes.

Other expertiseI also continue my service as Associate Editor for the journals Groundwater and the American Society of Civil Engineers – Journal of Hydrologic Engineering. I am also looking forward to the annual meeting of the Interna-tional Electrotechnical Committee (in Golden,

After finishing up my sabbatical on deep learning with IBM Research in Dublin, I filled my year with teaching, conferences, and publications.

Assistant Professor of Groundwater Modeling

"Deep learning is our generation's

electricity."

3433


PHOTO BY NICK STANLEY

Dr. Dan PeppeAnother fun and exciting year full of projects, student successes, and a research trip to Kenya.

Associate Professor of Paleomagnetism &

Paleobotany, Graduate Program

Director

different light conditions to see how shade af-fects the trees. We plan to use the results to improve existing CO2 proxies and to develop a proxy for shade that can be applied to fossils.

PhD student Aly Baumgartner is working on a project focused on developing leaf-based proxies for climate and ecology for African floras and on reconstructing Miocene fossil floras from Kenya. Last year, Aly traveled all over the world to photograph modern leaves from Africa to develop a paleoclimate model that can be applied to African fossil floras. (And in fact, she's in Kenya right now for more of the same.) Aly had several undergraduate research assistants helping her to process the photography. In particular, she's worked on this project with undergraduate Michaela Donahoo (photo to the left). The two of them presented this work at GSA in the fall. Michaela just completed her senior thesis on part of the study, in which she showed that by adding modern sites from Africa into our exist-ing datasets of modern leaves, it improves the model's ability to reconstruct the biome of Africa floras. An exciting and promising result.

Local outreachIn the fall, I worked closely with the Mayborn Museum to put together a host of activities for Earth Science week, including a sympo-sium on past, present, and future climate change and activities such as fossil and rock identification, use of a compass and map-ping, and disaster preparedness. During the week, we interacted with over 1,000 visitors, including several school groups. The week was a smashing success. You can watch a few videos from it on our Facebook account. My lab group and I have also done several other outreach events, including one with the Cub Scouts on rock, mineral, and fossil identifica-tion and a few different events about fossils at local schools. The outreach events are so much fun, and a wonderful way to engage kids in geology and paleontology early. Hope-fully we’ll convince a few of them to become future geologists!

Overall, it’s been a great year and I’m excited for the next one at Baylor and in Waco. I hope to see many of you at our alumni events! ▲

I continue in my role as the Graduate Program Director, which I find to be an interesting and rewarding position. It gives me the chance to interact often with graduate students and work with the Geoscience faculty and Baylor’s graduate school to expand and improve our program. I’ve also continued my active research and made a few interesting trips for research and conferences. As I write this, I’m getting ready to head to Kenya. I didn’t go to the field at all last year, so I’m looking forward to getting back into the field again soon!

My ongoing projects include 1) reconstruct-ing the climate and environments of Miocene hominoid sites in Kenya and Uganda, 2) understanding early Paleocene ecosystems in the San Juan Basin in New Mexico, 3) reconstructing Paleogene plant communi-

ties of the Gulf Coastal Plain, and 4) develop-ing paleoclimate and paleoecological proxies that can be applied to fossil leaves. And I've got a lab full of talented students to help.

Student updatesI’m happy to report that Caitlin Leslie defended her dissertation this spring and graduated in May. Her research was focused on developing a revised age model for a Cretaceous – Paleocene section in Big Bend National Park and developing an age and depositional model for middle Paleocene deposited in the San Juan Basin. Now, Caitlin works full time at Pioneer Natural Resources.

I’m also excited that Kennedy Oginga successfully defended his MS thesis this

spring and will be graduating in August. He's currently working as a geoscience technician for a drilling company in Midland. His thesis focused on three sites in western Kenya, where there is a dense fossil forest. This has important implications for our understanding of early Miocene hominoid evolution.

I also work with four other graduate stu-dents. Jenn Wagner is doing her MS thesis research on Paleogene fossil plants in Central Texas. So far, she’s collected fossils from sites around Bastrop, TX across the Paleocene – Eocene boundary. Her work will tell us more about what plant communities were like dur-ing this very warm time in Earth's history.

PhD students Andrew Flynn and Joe Mil-ligan are working on an early Paleocene project in the San Juan Basin in New Mexico. Andrew focuses on early Paleocene fossil floras. His research indicates that ones in the San Juan Basin are distinct from similar aged floras in North America, which is contrary to the prevailing ideas about early Paleocene floras. He has also reconstructed climate for these floras, which suggests that during the Paleogene the San Juan Basin in New Mexico was a tropical seasonal forest, which is much warmer and wetter than today!

Joe works to reconstruct CO2 for the early and middle Paleocene using fossil leaves. In par-ticular, he focuses on fossil sycamore leaves, which are common through the Paleocene record in New Mexico. So far, we’ve been able to make a few reconstructions of CO2 and will continue to expand this project. Plus, Joe has started a modern growth experiment in the Waco wetlands. He grows sycamore trees in

Top: Jenn Wagner prospects for fossil leaves near Bastrop, TX

Bottom: Joe Milligan and Kennedy Oginga finish up building one of the tree shade structures at the Lake Waco Wetlands




A brief introductionI grew up in New York City and attended Cor-nell University as an undergraduate, initially with the intent of graduating as an engineer (following in the footsteps of my parents). While in Ithaca, NY, I quickly rediscovered my passion for fossils, sea shells, and the outdoors during my time volunteering at the Paleontological Research Institute. So I promptly switched majors. After graduating with a B.Sc. in Science of Earth Systems with a concentration in Paleontology, I moved across the country to sunny Los Angeles to pursue my Ph.D. at the University of Southern California. After a year of postdoctoral work at USC, I moved back to the east coast for a year as a postdoc with the Florida Museum of Natural History. This brings us to the present, as I am writing this while sitting in my office in Florida while also making arrangements for my move to Waco in a few short weeks.

My researchThe main plot points of my research focus on better understanding important events in the history of life, whether that be the evolution of individual organisms or ecological com-munities as a whole, that gave rise to the world we are familiar with today. I accomplish this through study of marine invertebrate fossils, with specific focus on sea urchins and mollusks (both which have a rich fossil record in Texas!). I am interested in exploring periods of Earth’s history that had significant and far-reaching consequences for the history of life, such as mass extinction and evolution-ary radiations. This includes study of the Permian-Triassic Mass Extinction and the Mesozoic Marine Revolution. The Permian-

Triassic extinction, the largest extinction in the history of (metazoan) life, ushered in the time of the ‘Modern Fauna’, which consists of the progenitors of the animals we are familiar with today. The Mesozoic marine Revolution, a time of rapid evolution of both biodiver-sity and ecological complexity, restructured communities into the complex, competitive, and interwoven food webs of our modern oceans. Ongoing projects include work on elucidating the role of sea urchins and their predators in the evolutionary arms race that is the Mesozoic Marine Revolution, exploring the long-term evolutionary consequences of the Permian-Triassic mass extinction on op-portunistic organisms, and disentangling the impacts of biotic and abiotic processes in the recovery of post-extinction ecosystems.

Summer plansMy husband and I are looking forward to moving to Waco this August, unfortunately too late to be potential candidates for a new season of Fixer Upper. Before my business in Florida is complete, however, I have one last trip to take this summer. I and a group of colleagues are touring several natural his-tory museums in Europe (the Natural History Museum in London, the Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle in Paris, and the Naturhis-torisches Museum in Basel) to collect data for the sea urchin project. While in Paris, I will also be attending the 5th International Paleonto-logical Congress to present the preliminary results of this ongoing project. ▲

Dr. Elizabeth PetsiosI'm excited to join the Geosciences Department and broader Baylor community—and continue the strong tradition of research and student mentorship that Dr. Rena Bonem has built here.

Assistant Professor of Paleontology

Valley of FireDr. Petsios on a field trip to Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada to collect Early Triassic fossils.



NASA InSightI recently had the privilege to serve on the NASA InSight Science Panel, evaluating re-search proposals to analyze the first seismic data to be acquired on Mars. For the first time, the InSIGHT lander (Interior explora-tion using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) will make geophysical measurement from the surface of Mars, with the goal to better understand the planet’s subsurface structure. The lander will include three-component broadband and short period seismometers, a heat flow probe, a geodetic experiment, and a magnetometer, in addition to meteorological sensors. The InSight mis-sion is well underway; the lander, launched on May 5, 2018, is due to touch down on November 26 in the area of Elysium Planitia, and has an expected lifetime of 1 Martian year (~2 Earth years). Because its record may retain the earliest evolutionary history of the processes that shaped it, Mars offers a great opportunity to study the formation of rocky planets in the Inner Solar System. The number and high quality of the propos-als we reviewed made me confident that we will learn a great deal, providing all goes well with the landing and instrument deployment. I am excited to see the results. The mission’s website (https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/) has a real-time ticker that shows the distances trav-eled and remaining before the lander reaches Mars’s surface. As I write this, the spacecraft is in cruise stage, traveling at 12,563 km/hr relative to the Sun, and has gone 9,853,869 km. Only another 69,115,511 km remains before November 26. ▲

This year, we made a lot of progress on our DOE-funded project. The goal is to develop an automated seismic processing system by extending the functionality of some tried and true equipment (a REFTEK digitizer/recorder) by adding a Raspberry Pi processor to each station/node and sending data between nodes via Wifi. We call the result the Raspber-ry Pi-Enhanced REFTEK, or RaPiER. Last sum-mer, we successfully tested a prototype of the system at a geothermal site in Nevada. This summer, we will test the full-blown, 150-node system in Waco and then again in Nevada, at a different geothermal site, in September. This grant now supports two graduate students and a postdoctoral researcher at Baylor, which greatly expands our seismology group and makes our lab an exciting place to be.

Caribbean collaborationMy group maintains an active collaboration with colleagues at the Dominican Republic’s national seismic network and the University of Santo Domingo as well as with the Puerto Rico Seismic Network and the University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez. Together, we have installed a 16-station broadband seismic net-work in the Dominican Republic and are jointly analyzing the data. This effort has been sup-ported by the National Science Foundation, the Dominican Ministerio de Educación Supe-rior, Ciencia y Tecnología (MESCyT), and funds from the W.M. Keck endowment at Baylor.

Postdoc Diego Quiros and I made invited presentations at a workshop in Santo Domin-go in March and used the opportunity to visit, check, and download data from several of our

broadband seismic stations on the island. We also made seven presentations concerning NE Caribbean work at the combined meeting of the Seismological Society of America and Latin America and Caribbean Seismological Commission in May 2018. These included one each by graduate students Hannah Mejia and Debajeet Barman, two by postdoc Diego Quiros, and one by undergraduate geophysics major Christina Martinez. This meeting was originally scheduled in San Juan, Puerto Rico in April but had to be moved after Puerto Rico was devastated by hurricanes Irma and Maria in September 2017. At the meeting, I was asked by the director of the Puerto Rico Seismic Network to help them re-install seismic stations that were destroyed by the hurricanes. This will be a good oppor-tunity to provide important field (and cultural) experiences for our students, while also lend-ing a helping hand to our fellow Americans in a time of need.

We presented results from research into the structure and tectonics of the southern United States at a special session I organized at the annual meeting of the American Geo-physical Union (AGU) in December 2017. This grew out of an NSF-supported workshop we held at Baylor in February 2017. Attendance by two Baylor graduate students at the an-nual meeting of the AGU was supported by Keck funds.

Student updatesI currently advise five graduate students and two undergrads. I also expect two PhD stu-dents to finish up this year. Undergraduate geophysics major Christina Martinez, who presented her research “Hazard Implications from High-Precision Earthquake Relocations in the Dominican Republic” at the annual meet-ing of the Seismological Society of America in May 2018, will also complete a senior thesis on that topic in the coming year. During the summer, I'm hosting two undergraduates from other institutions as interns. They will par-ticipate in a wide range of activities with our group, including field work associated with our seismic array test and various data analyses in the lab. One of these students will be sup-ported by the NSF, the other by DOE funds.

Ben Sadler, a Dallas native who recently graduated from Purdue University, starts his studies for a master’s degree this summer. He joins Debajeet Barman and Alden Netto in studying lithospheric structure of the Gulf Coast. Each of these students has their own approach, using distinct but complementary data to model structure in the crust and up-per mantle. The data available are not ideal for unraveling the complex structure that is generally hidden beneath kilometers of sedi-ments, so we will combine and model different datasets jointly. We expect the results to shed light on several of the larger features that are critical to understanding the tectonic history of the region and to identify areas that need more data and denser sampling.

Dr. Jay PulliamA year filled with a DOE-funded project, collaboration with colleagues in the Dominican Republic, and the chance to serve on the NASA InSight Science Panel.

W.M. Keck Foundation Professor of Geophysics, Solid-Earth Geophysics,

and Seismology

Top: From left to right, Jay Pulliam, postdoc Diego Quiros, and grad student Joseph Thangraj backpack in the Sierra Nevada mountains after our hot and dusty seismic field test in Nevada

Middle: From left to right, graduate students Joseph Thangraj and Frank Sepulveda, with John Dunbar during the Nevada field test of our new seismic array

Bottom: Graduate student Joseph Thangraj surveys a line for our Nevada field test




JAN 2018: Wayne Hamilton and Erin Noonan helped me with an aquifer test on the Middle Trinity aquifer for the CUWCD.

MAR 2018: I attended the South Central Geo-logical Society of America conference in Little Rock, Arkansas, along with Wayne Hamilton, Erin Noonan, and BS student Kenadi Sutton. Erin and Kenadi presented their research, and I shared research on health and trace elements from work by Stephanie Wong and former MS student Joshua Kirby. Wayne also shared our experience with the newly acquired Geoprobe coring rig. Stephanie Wong also appeared on the “Meet an Aquatic Scientist” program led by Melissa Mullins of CRASR through the online program of “nepris” (connecting industry to every classroom). Her presentation connected with 233 students from 10 classrooms in Oregon, Georgia, Loui-siana, California, and Texas. The classroom teachers gave positive feedback.

APR 25, 2018: I participated in a workshop for the Southern Trinity Groundwater Conser-vation District, where Jacob Jarvis demon-strated the Geoprobe coring rig to the STGCD board members and others.

April 30, 2018: We had liftoff – I mean “drawdown”! This marked the start of a 30-day constant-rate pumping test in the Hosston formation of the Trinity aquifer in Eastern Bell County. An aquifer test of this magnitude

and duration is rare, and the pumping rate may be one of the largest on record from the Trinity aquifer – 1175 gpm! I worked with Wayne Hamilton and some of Dr. James' students. Stephanie Wong, Will Brewer, Jacob Jarvis, Erin Noonan, Jiajun Jiang, and Bulbul Ahmmed (and family) were all participants. The water from the pumping well filled a 14-acre reservoir 10 feet deep and was produced at 43.4o C (110o F). Students gathered water samples, measured water levels, and met with hydrogeologist Bob Harden, Clearwater Underground Water Conservation District manager Dirk Aaron, and other professional personnel to discuss methods and results.

MAY 2018: Stephanie Wong and I assisted the USGS Groundwater training days in Bell County. Stephanie gave background with a presentation and handout for the USGS geo-scientists performing spontaneous potential transects at the downtown spring complex in Salado, Texas, while I shared results from pumping tests previously conducted in the Edwards aquifer near the Gault archaeologi-cal site to provide context for the borehole geophysical group.

Other newsI'm currently serving as Director for The Institute of Ecological, Earth and Environmen-tal Sciences (TIEES) as well as managing the Baylor Wastewater Research Program. I also serve on the Central Texas Audubon Society

checklist committee. Recently, I was called to help identify several potentially mislabeled bird specimens of the Mayborn Museum col-lection, a task I thoroughly enjoyed.

Family updateDaughter Abigail and son-in-law Jared White live in Plano with the grandkids: Kenedy (1), Hamilton (first grade), and Madison (third grade!). Son Cal, daughter-in-law Rachel, and Elizabeth (10 months) live in Buda, Texas where he is a senior business analyst for Mitratech. Son Logan completed his second year as an assistant professor at Prairie View University in the psychology department. Logan and daughter-in-law Rachel Beth, grandson Bryce (4), grandson Nolan (2), and grandchild (TBD) live near Brenham, Texas. Diane is enjoying retirement while helping on the home front babysitting grandchildren, staying active in Bible study with friends, and serving at Columbus Avenue Baptist Church with internationals and Brook Avenue elemen-tary students.

I continue to serve as a deacon and teach Sunday School with Diane at Columbus Avenue Baptist Church. We still live at 706 Woodland West, Woodway, Texas. Visitors are always welcome! ▲

I'm happy to report that our groundwater group is in dynamic equilibrium. Jim Tucker was discharged with his MS degree, and the group was recharged with new MS student, Erin Noonan. We expect the newest MS stu-dent, Wynne Casteel, to increase our aquifer level this fall. Here's what we've been up to.

Highlights of the yearAUG 2017: I and graduate students Will Brew-er, Jacob Jarvis and Stephanie Wong went to the Texas Groundwater Summit sponsored by the Texas Alliance of Groundwater Districts. We were joined by alumni Joshua Brownlow (PhD '15) and Robert Bradley (MS '93).

SEPT 2017: I took my hydrogeology class, several grad students, and Wayne Hamilton

to the Hydrogeo workshop at Cave Without A Name near Boerne, Texas. I served on the planning committee for the workshop and taught a module on the FLIR infrared camera applications to hydrogeology, while Stephanie Wong taught a module on using the RAD 7 to monitor radon as a groundwater tracer. Also this month, Stephanie and I also attended the Oklahoma University WaTER international conference. There, Stephanie presented our work at Restoration Gateway orphanage and school in northern Uganda. A highlight of the conference for Stephanie was having lunch with fellow Canadian and groundwater legend, Dr. John Cherry (photo 2).

OCT 2017: I attended the Geological Society of America meeting in Seattle with wife Diane,

four students, and two colleagues. We made seven oral and poster presentations.

NOV 2017: The Dividing the Water Confer-ence came to Baylor University, hosted by the Law School. Here, I taught groundwater basics and described issues to 50 judges. I then led a field trip with the help of the Brazos River Authority, the Southern Trin-ity Groundwater Conservation District, the Clearwater Underground Water Conservation District, the United States Geological Survey, Wayne Hamilton, and Baylor hydrogeology students Stephanie Wong, Will Brewer, Jacob Jarvis, and Erin Noonan. Later in November, Stephanie Wong and I shared hydrogeol-ogy with members of the Texas Alliance of Groundwater Districts.

Dr. Joe Yelderman8 students, 16 presentations, 5 grants, 4 conferences, 4 workshops, 2 aquifer tests, 1 online presentation, 1 field trip, and 1 mission trip. What a flow system! Also, 7 grandchildren, 3 children and 1 wife. What a family!

Professor of Hydrology & Wastewater




A big focus this year has been the upcom-ing changes to the Arts and Sciences core curriculum and its effect on our introductory students. Our labs already provide a variety of hands-on experiences with the oral and written communication opportunities desired in the new core. Our department will continue to work with the administration to ensure an excellent undergraduate experience through the coming changes.

A solar eclipseMy favorite event this year was the solar eclipse on August 21, 2017, which also hap-pened to be the first day of class. Around 150 of our students and faculty gathered to see 76% of the sun eclipsed in Waco. We were lucky to buy our solar viewers very early in June, when the waiting list was only six weeks! With the help of Bruce Byars in The Center for Spatial Research (CSR), we also obtained temperature, solar radiation, and UV data for August 21st and the adjacent days. The data has been incorporated into our GEO 1408 (Earth Science) course, which lets students explore topics in astronomy and meteorology.

PartnershipsThis past year also saw the establishment of two partnerships which I anticipate will be critical for engaging the public and potentially recruiting future students. We were able to establish a partnership with the Mayborn Mu-seum for Earth Science Week (October 2017), that allowed us to fill a week with geoscience activities at the museum. Activities included rocks and fossils, our fluorescent mineral cabinet, our earthquake hazard models, and a narrated video of our tsunami tank. Several

Baylor faculty and numerous graduate stu-dents participated through the week.

We're also working with Courtney Jerkins, the science coordinator for Midway ISD, to ensure more consistent opportunities with our local school systems. We worked with two schools this year: Woodway Elementary in December 2017 and South Bosque Elementary in April. We hosted 140 fourth graders of Woodway on campus, while we visited ~100 third graders of South Bosque at their campus. It is always a joy to work with younger students, as they exhibit enthusiasm for science and ask en-gaging questions.

Presentations and talksThe third meeting of the Earth Educator Ren-dezvous was held in Albuquerque, NM in sum-mer 2017. Designed to improve undergraduate education, this is a meeting of Earth science educators at all levels to discuss strategies,

activities, and challenges in undergraduate education, as well as a variety of other educa-tional topics. I had the opportunity to present our graduate teaching assistant training and student feedback as we work to ensure our teaching assistants are receiving excellent professional development.

This was my third year to speak to the Waco Master Naturalists, a group of 10-15 people each year who are going through the training. They appreciate being able to see not only a variety of rock samples during the talk, but to gain some field experience as well. As al-ways, it is a pleasure to work with community members who are interested in learning about geoscience. ▲

Left: Projection of max eclipse in Waco (76%)Right: Graduate student Katarena Shiner helps Woodway elementary students measure seismic waves

Sharon BrowningIt's been an exciting year for outreach and our intro labs here at Baylor. My continued focus is to expose our students to the wonders of geoscience, and to prepare them to be scientifically literate citizens.

Geology Freshman Laboratory Coordinator

Staff Updates

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESSTAFF

NEWSLETTER FALL 2018 44PHOTO BY EVAN KIRBY

Teaching & presentationsThis year, I took part in two of Dr. Joe's class-es: Environmental Geology and Hydrogeology. This gave me the chance to interact with students and share my relevant experience working at Shell Oil. I also created and led sev-eral hydrogeology field labs, with hands-on field experience. For example, we visited four service stations and learned about under-ground gasoline release.

In the spring, I taught two classes of my own (middle photo). The first was Research Meth-ods and Presentations, which helps students create either a poster or a presentation for Baylor’s Undergraduate Research Scholarly Achievement event in March. It's a great way to give students a forum and experience to communicate their work. The photo at the top shows Bradley Rains and Rachel Bruyere, who each won an award at the event. My sec-ond class was a new one that preps students for the Fundamentals of Geology exam, the first step to becoming a licensed Geologist in Texas.

In October at GSA 2017, Dr. Joe and I pre-sented a poster about how students learn, through everything from class lectures, field activities, writing assignments, and presenta-tions. I also presented eight key learning ar-eas around how to teach a successful senior level research methods class.

To communicate with non-major students about Geosciences, I gave a presentation called “Pouring My Cup into Yours” at a Baylor Undergraduate Research in Science and Technology meeting. I shared my career learn-ings to help students with education and em-ployment planning decisions. I also reached out to the Baylor Undergraduate Research in

Science and Technology (BURST) organiza-tion and hosted a Geoscience lab tour. I led BURST students on a walking tour of multiple Geoscience labs, with graduate students describing their research. Finally, I participated in two recruiting outreach meetings, interfac-ing with undeclared majors, plus an evening forum with parents and their children.

In November, Dr. Joe and his graduate stu-dents hosted a day of the Dividing the Waters hydrogeology workshop. I presented about equipment to sample and obtain data from groundwater wells.

Research supportI worked with Dr. Joe on a project to determine the quantity and quality of the Brazos River Alluvium aquifer groundwater. We got financial support from the Southern Trinity Groundwa-ter Conservation District (STGCD) and Brazos River Authority. Our job is to give the STGCD data so they can better manage the alluvial groundwater. The research was completed on time, on budget, with a written report and a presentation to the STGCD Board.

I helped Dr. Joe with the safety and opera-tions of our Geoprobe rig, which is what the department uses to assess subsurface sites. In addition, I supported graduate student drill-ers Rebecca Taormina and Jacob Jarvis with field Geoprobe coring.

Working with undergrads on research proj-ects is an area I’m passionate about, so I've helped two of Dr. Joe's students. First, Gabby Dena (middle left), who did a hydrogeological assessment of Tonkawa Falls, in Crawford, Texas. Gabby’s research was made into a GSA poster and displayed at the Seattle meet-ing. Plus, she presented her work to the City of Crawford mayor. Second, Kenadi Sut-

ton (middle right) did an assessment of the Hydrogeology of Spillway Creek in Bell County, Texas. She presented at GSA South-Central Little Rock annual meeting and Baylor’s an-nual celebration of undergraduate research in March.

Other supportKnowing the importance of admin activities that support the Geoscience Department, I help in two other areas. First is with the de-partment vehicles, such as annual registration stickers, maintenance, and repairs (bottom left). Second, I help with lab and safety sup-port. This includes monthly audits to make sure we follow Baylor’s safety program.

PersonalMy wife and I have been enjoying our rural living on two acres in a ranch-styled house in Lorena, Texas. This year, we upgraded our bathrooms and flooring, and I continue to thrive on keeping the yard looking great.

I’ve also recently developed a love for American Civil War history. This sparked when I discovered original civil war letters of my great-uncle and great-grandfather. I’ve visited several battlefields where they fought, the best known being Vicksburg National Military Park in Mississippi. In March and November, I visited the Circuit of the America sports car racing track in Austin (bottom right). To be in the paddock and see the cars and drivers up close is so exciting. The booming sounds and fast speeds are exhilarating.

I’m grateful for this second career I’ve had at Baylor and look forward to continue serving the students and faculty. ▲

Wayne HamiltonAfter retiring from Shell Oil Company in 2014, I've had the privilege of being involved with Baylor students and faculty in several ways. Here are the highlights.

Program Consultant & Lab Safety Coordinator



Visiting faculty

Dr. Yougui Song visited us for a year from the Chi-nese Academy of Sciences in Xian. He studies loess records to understand climate change in central Asia, particularly in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, where little knowledge exists.

Dr. Xiaohua Guo, who had a 2-year China Scholar-ship Council award to study in the lab, was retained after her PhD as a post-doctoral scholar. Her interest is in deciphering the dynamics of the Yellow River over the past 2 million years. Dr. Guo returned to China at the end of July, where applications are pending with indigenous universities and possible positions as an OSL lab coordinator.

Visiting PhDs

Xiaoyun Yang, a PhD candidate from Wuhan Uni-versity departed at the beginning of this year, after spending a year in the OSL lab, understanding the chronology of terrace and wetland deposits along the Yangtze River, China.

In late Fall 2018, we welcomed Liang Peng, a PhD student from the Institute of Geology and Geophys-ics in Beijing, with a two-year China Scholarship Council award. His research lies in better under-standing the evolution of deserts. Peng is also learning more about the details of OSL dating, with possibilities of setting up a lab in China.

Baylor undergrads

Anna Hodges worked with Kasey Bolles on our NSF-supported 1930s drought project. She now works with an affiliated Apple partner in Austin, putting her GIS skills to good use and getting experience before grad school. Chris and Connor continued working in the lab as research assistants, as a stepping-stone for future opportunities.

Chris Dickey has worked in the lab for 4.5 years. He is a trusted colleague, who is skilled especially in acid chemistry and is an able instructor for novices in the lab. His long-term goal is to work in the envi-ronmental science sector.

Connor Mayhack has worked in the lab for 3 years and has become a trusted and multi-talented research partner. Connor is helpful and insightful in the field, particularly when using the departmental Geoprobe. He has mastered particle size analysis with the Malvern and ably described cores from the Monahans dune system, west Texas and the Red River. He is advancing the analysis of data through preparing stratigraphic logs with a bevy of associ-ated data. We have encouraged Connor to seek graduate programs to further sharpen his skills.

Victoria Tew graduated in May 2018 and has worked in the lab for 3 years. She's starting her MSc research this summer, advised by Steve Forman, studying the aeolian deposition record in the Mona-han’s Dune Field.

Liliana MarinThis year, the Geoluminescence Dating Research Lab supported 7 undergrads, 3 grad students, 1 PhD candidate, and 2 visiting scholars.

Lab Manager - Geoluminescence

Dating Research Lab

About the lab

The Geoluminescence Dating Research Laboratory has the scientific capabilities for Optically-

Stimulated Luminescence (OSL). This is a form of geochronology that quantifies the radiation

dosimetric properties of common minerals, such as quartz and potassium feldspar. The goal is to provide depositional ages for the past 1-2 million

years for many sedimentary systems.

The lab is unique to Texas, one of only eight similar labs in the U.S. The lab provides new chronologic

knowledge, process-based interpretations and data for evaluating quantitative models for a

variety of tectonic, environmental, climatologic and anthropogenic systems across the planet.

Research in the lab focusses on addressing “grand challenges” for the discipline, such as assessing the timing and pace climate change as reflected

in drought and flood records, the spatial and tem-poral distribution of intraplate seismicity, and the

timing of the peopling of the Americas.


PHOTO BY BLAKE CHEEK47



Last year was my eighth year running our Stable Isotope Spectrometry Lab at Baylor. To provide reliable data and other related ser-vices for faculty and students from Baylor and other universities, I had to generate enough funds to cover ordinary lab operating costs and keep the lab running smoothly and safely. There were a couple of interesting repair stories to share.

Replacing a reactorLast October, I noticed that the Costech EA occasionally stopped running through the sample table. I eventually discovered that the EA’s left reactor couldn’t hold the desired temperature during analysis. So the EA would stop running samples if it couldn’t reach the desired temperature. This has happened before, so I thought I could just set the left combustion tube at a lower temperature. But this time, that fix didn't work. After consult-ing the manufacturer, I powered off the instrument and opened it up to measure the resistance of both the thermocouple and the furnace to see which one caused the problem. Sadly, I had to replace both items for the left reactor. To do so, I had to dissemble the whole EA system, which meant working with tangled connection wires and cables and a heavy heating box. Fortunately, I managed to complete the task on my own. The EA has been working well since.

Upgrading the mass spectrometerThe second major breakdown happened in February this year and was associated with the Duo Inlet system of our mass spectrom-

eter. First, the cooling fan for the turbo pump stopped working, so I placed service call #1 to our new service provider, REMI. While we were still waiting on that first part, four days later, the whole Duo Inlet system was completely down. This shutdown has happened a few times before and was most likely caused by broken rotary pump because it has poor heat tolerance. So I placed service call #2. Although our REMI representative kept calling Thermo, it still took me six days to receive the parts from Thermo for my first and second service calls. Unfortunately, I then realized that the Duo Inlet system’s turbo pump was broken as well after I installed the new parts. Service call #3. Seven days later, I got a new turbo pump for the system. This is a newly upgraded model, and its connection port has a slightly different size, which needed to be rethreaded for installation. To do this, I was able to get help from Dr. Craig Moehnke and Mr. Joe Mc-Cullock.

Analyzing speleothem fluidI also spent some time on our new speleo-them fluid extraction device, trying to calcu-late absolute paleotemperatures from speleo-them fluid inclusion hydrogen stable isotope analysis. A very small piece of stalagmite from Bottom’s Up Cave in British Columbia, Canada, was selected for this purpose because previ-ous study has yielded some solid data for comparison. The whole analytical process is very long and complicated. Speleothem fluid inclusion was first liberated by our extraction device through a crushing-cryogenic trapping-heating process, then converted to hydrogen gas by passing through TC/EA’s pyrolysis

reactor, which eventually reached the CFIRMS for acquiring hydrogen isotope ratios. Later, the crushed speleothem powders were col-lected for measuring its oxygen isotope ratios on Gas Bench II. After isotopic analyses, fluid inclusion hydrogen isotopes need to convert to oxygen isotopes first based on local mete-oric water line, then oxygen isotopes of both fluid inclusion and speleothem calcite need to convert to the same scale, and eventually the precipitation temperature of the speleothem is determined by oxygen isotope fractionation factor between the trapped inclusion water and its surrounding calcite. Our fluid inclu-sion hydrogen isotope and paleotemperature data agree well with previous study results obtained by different extraction method, indicating that our speleothem fluid inclusion extraction device is fully tuned and calibrated for wide use. A new SOP was also created for speleothem fluid extraction and calibration.

I really love working here at Baylor. To all the professors, office staff, and students from Geosciences and beyond:

Thanks for all the kind support!

Dr. Ren ZhangIn my eighth year at Baylor, I continued to provide reliable data for faculty and students. This meant generating funds and fixing issues that cropped up.

Lab Manager - Stable Isotope Spectrometry Lab Field Camp

S U M M E R 2 0 1 8



Special guestWe were visited by 40 bison, including this mother with her precious baby.

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Top left: "Can anybody figure out where we are on the base map?"

Bottom left: Drafting up a map in the Spring Mountains

Top right: Happy field camp students in Idaho

Middle right: Nearing the end of a 6-mile hike

Bottom right: Learning how to shoot a bearing with a Brunton compass

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Measuring at Petrified Forest National Park

Measuring the dip of the slip face

Nicole collecting data on the dune

project

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Top left: Gathering field data from Yellowstone hydro thermal waters

Middle left: Homework in the campground is always fun

Bottom left: Jie measures the orientation of a steeply dipping Cambrian sandstone in Utah

Top right: Titrating Madison River water

Bottom right: Rest stop at White City, Utah57 58

BGS: Baylor Geological Society

We had another successful year helping Geoscience students reach their educational goals and do community outreach.

Finding advisors and mentorsIn the fall, the BGS held a meeting where the undergraduate students were educated on how to best approach potential graduate advisors and to find graduate students that could mentor them through the graduate school application process.

Community outreach and eventsThe BGS was also able to team up with the Mayborn Museum to provide a community outreach activity to teach the public about how to prepare for natural disasters. This

activity was in response to the tragic flooding during Hurricane Harvey and was successful at teaching the community about the possible natural disasters that could occur in Waco, Texas, steps that could be taken to prepare for these natural disasters, and instructing families on what would be considered wants vs. necessities in a disaster situation. We did a hands-on activity where we scattered supplies and household items around a room and had participants pack a backpack as if they were evacuating their home in a disaster. People often found that their backpacks were too heavy, so they wouldn't be able to carry them a long distance. The participants could then unpack the backpack, reevaluate their supplies, and repack the bag.

The BGS also participated in a Brazos River clean up, where our members donated their time to pick up trash along the Brazos River. We also organized a field trip to the Brazos River Authority, where members of the club learned about how water resources are man-aged and distributed. Finally, we were also able to work with National Geographic to get

an exclusive premiere of their new earth/cli-mate science series One Strange Rock.

Invited talksThe BGS and the applied petroleum systems program at Baylor invited Dr. Quinn Passey for a short course called ‘Yikes, My Source Rock is Now my Reservoir’ where Dr. Passey taught BGS members about petrophysics and unconventional reservoir characterization. We also invited Adam Damman, along with other geoscientists from Pioneer Natural Resources, to give a talk about the early career path of a petroleum geoscientist. This talk was useful because it gave BGS members a good understanding of what to expect for an early petroleum career. ▲

Below: Members and sponsors of BGS enjoy themselves at our Christmas bowling activity in December 2017

Student Groups

BAWG: Baylor Association for Women Geoscientists

In spring 2018, the Baylor Association for Women Geoscientists (BAWG) was officially approved for charter as both a Baylor student organization and a student chapter of AWG.

Our goal is to provide a supportive and en-couraging environment for our members and to promote the professional development of women geoscientists. At Baylor, we hope to achieve these goals through networking, com-munity, and mentorship.

WorkshopsThis past spring, AWG conducted a work-shop in the Women in the Academy (WITA) Conference at the Mayborn Museum with a screening of “The Bearded Lady Project” and a panel that included Dr. Binetti (anthropol-ogy), Dr. Hoggarth (anthropology), Dr. Deirdre Fulton (religion), and our very own Dr. Aislyn (Trendell) Barclay (PhD, 2012). We concluded the semester with our first His/Her Story where faculty members James Fulton, Deirdre Fulton, Katie Binetti, and Steve Dworkin shared stories about what defines them both personally and professionally. This allowed conversation about balancing personal and professional life. We appreciated the faculty members’ willingness to share their stories.

What's nextFall 2018 will be full of optimism and excitement as it is our first full semester as a chartered or-ganization. Some of the main events we have planned are His/Her Stories with alternating students and faculty each month, a screening of “The Bearded Lady Project” for the depart-ment, and various smaller events to promote community and mentorship within the depart-ment. We have been invited to participate in a college/career fair at a local high school, where we hope to encourage participation in the geosciences.

As networking is one of the main pillars of BAWG, we hope to build a strong relationship with alumni and friends of the geosciences department in the future. We appreciate your support and are open to suggestions for ways to ensure BAWG thrives at Baylor. We are excited to see this organization grow!

Sincerely, Anna Thorson // BAWG PresidentElisabeth Rau // BAWG Vice President

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESSTUDENT GROUPS


BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESSTUDENT GROUPS


Bart YeatesNational Association of Geoscience Teachers Outstanding TA Award for 2018 for his work as TA for GEO 1402 - World Oceans

Bradley RainsUndergraduate Research and Scholarly Achievement Award

Carson SteinmannRepresented the Geosciences Department at the 2018 College of Arts & Sciences Honors Convocation

Emily BlackabyAmerican Institute of Professional Geologists (AIPG) Foss Scholarship

Erin NoonanFirst place in the Elan Allen Safety Scholarship for outstanding safety plans in field work; award from Texas Water Resources Institute for her thesis research

Jie GengJames Dixon Undergraduate Field Assistant Scholarship

Joe MilliganDallas Paleontological Society's Frank Crane Scholarship award

Lindy Dingmore Represented the Geosciences Department at the 2018 College of Arts & Sciences Honors Convocation

Logan WeistOutstanding Paper from the Society for Sedimentary Geology for his article published in PALAIOS in 2016

Michaela DonahooUndergraduate Research and Scholarly Achievement Award

Rachel H. BruyereRobert T. Hill Award for Academic Excellence in Geology; Undergraduate Research and Scholarly Achievement Award

Stephanie WongSecond place in the Elan Allen Safety Scholarship for outstanding safety plans in field work

December 2017Doctor of PhilosophyWilliam E. LukensMiocene Paleoenvironments and Paleosol pH Proxies

MS in GeologyLance J. AugusteFactors Influencing Head-cut Migration within a Cohesive Texas Blackland Gully

Jared J. HansonCharacterizing the Reservoir Quality of Marcellus Formation Mudrocks through a Comparison of Chemostratigraphic Character and Petrophysical Response in North-Central Pennsylvania

David (Bart) W. YeatesReconstruction of the Paleo-Redox Conditions of Reservoir Facies Using Chemostratigraphy and Core Descriptions of the Devonian Marcellus Shale, Pennsylvania

BS in GeologyChance B. BrittonRichard D. CorleyGabrielle D. DenaJohn (Chris) DickeyAndrew C. FutcherConnor J. MayhackChioma H. OkechukwuClifton M. Posey

May 2018Doctor of PhilosophyCaitlin E. LeslieHigh-resolution Age Constraints and Fluvial Sedimentology of late Cretaceous to Early Paleocene Terrestrial Deposits

MS in GeologyOwen D. CravenOrganic Matter Structural Changes during Catagenesis

James J. TuckerA Hydrologic Assessment of Water Chemistry and Aquifer Properties in the Middle Trinity Aquifer

BS in GeologyAdrian Charles, Jr.Lindy DingmoreMichaela A. DonahooEmily J. GackstatterMark A. GarrisonHayden E. JohnsonEmily M. KentJulia R. MassieDaniel J. PinillosBradley J. RainsCarson D. SteinmannKenadi L. SuttonVictoria L. Tew

BS in GeophysicsKhang T. Vo

August 2018

Doctor of PhilosophyLogan A. WiestTaphonomic and Mass-extinction Research from an Ichnological Perspective

MS in GeologyKennedy O. OgingaPaleoclimate and Paleoenvironment Reconstruction of Early Miocene Tinderet Sites in Western Kenya, and Its Implications for Hominoid Evolution.

BS in GeologyRachel H. BruyereReed T. Rightmer

Graduates AwardsWe're proud of these talented, hard-working students for getting awards from various groups at Baylor—and beyond.

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESGRADUATES & AWARDS

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Stay in touch.Let us know where you are and what you're doing! We'll use this info to update our departmental files. Or we can feature you in next year's newsletter.

Baylor UniversityDepartment of GeologyOne Bear Place #97354Waco, TX 76798-7354

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Send by snail mailFill out the form on the back of this page, fold it in half, add a stamp, and drop it in the mail.

Send by emailYou can also email your updates to Paulette at [email protected].

Send your picturesAlso, remember we have the Geokid bulletin board in the office with photos of children of alumni. To add yours, send your pictures to [email protected].

When

Friday, November 26-8 p.m.

Where

Baylor Sciences Building E401 Clock Tower

63

You're invited.Join us at the Geosciences Department open house to kick off Homecoming 2018.

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESALUMNI

What's new?Name:

Class of:

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Phone: Email:

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Alumni News

66

Dr. Bill Brown It is with sadness that we note the death of Dr. Bill Brown, who was both a Baylor Geology alumnus (BS 1956) and professor (1981-1997). Dr. Brown passed away on January 17, 2018. He worked as an exploration geologist for Chevron for 23 years before coming to Baylor to teach structural geology in 1981. He was a renowned structural geologist who served as an AAPG Distinguished Lecturer and was named “Scientist of the Year” in 1990 by the Rocky Mountain Association of Geologists. While at Baylor, he was highly sought after as a mentor by many students. Condolences to Dr. Brown’s family, friends, and the many former students he mentored.

Claretta BrownThe wife of former professor Dr. Bill Brown alsopassed on March 10, 2018. Claretta attended Wesley Hospital School of Nursing and graduated and went to work at the same hospital as an OB/GYN nurse in 1955. That same year, she was introduced to Bill by their mutual friend, Shirley Shaffer Walker. Bill and Claretta were married on September 2, 1956. Claretta's life can be summed up in "the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous (wo)man avails much." She was a wonderful role model to her children and others of the importance of prayer in the life of a believer.

Dwayne Crumpler (MS, 1989)

Alumnus Dwayne Crumpler passed away suddenly Sunday, May 27, 2018 from a heart attack. He leaves his wife Suzanne Dahl Crumpler (also an alumnus), son Travis Crumpler (20) and daughter Lydia Crumpler (17). He will be deeply missed by family, friends, and those lucky enough to have worked with him.

In 1989, Dwayne received an MS from Baylor specializing in hydrogeology and focusing on the Paluxy aquifer. While at Baylor, he met his wife, Suzanne Dahl, who also specialized in Hydrogeology (MS, 1990). Dwayne helped solve environmental problems across the US, including Hawaii, before settling in Washington State to raise his family. Dwayne would spend over 20 years working on high-level nuclear waste issues at the Hanford site. He was a true public servant and represented Baylor well as a professional geoscientist, a husband, and a father. Condolences to the Crumpler family from the Baylor family.

Greg Hild (MS, 1985)

Passed from esophageal cancer last December

Norma Lee HultschCondolences to Dr. Steve & Marylaine Driese and family on the passing of Steve’s mother, Norma Lee, on August 12, 2018. Mrs. Hultsch loved cooking all types of foods, especially corned beef, spaghetti, lasagna. She was also fond of baking breads, cakes, pies, and cookies, and she was always crocheting afghans and baby clothes for everyone. She adored her grandchildren and great grandchildren and was often found playing Scrabble with them or reading them stories. Dancing with the Stars and American Idol were her favorite shows, and she was often seen with a Shamrock Shake in her hand.

Glen B. Miller (BS, 1969)

Passed on July 3, 2017 from an inoperable brain tumor

What's new

Lloyd Warner (BS, 1981)

I recently bought a Baylor-themed golf cart for use around my neighborhood. It proudly features the Baylor Geology logo, in addi-tion to the Baylor logo. Sic'em Bears!

Susie Cochran (BS, 1996)

I'm still with the U.S. Geological Survey, Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center in Santa Cruz CA. As the Assistant Deputy Center Director, I oversee our Center’s information products to make sure our scientists follow USGS Fundamental Science Practices, create and implement local workflow procedures, and train incoming scientists in Scientific Project Management. I’m still involved with Pacific coral reefs studies, but don’t get to do much fieldwork any longer. For fun I enjoy ‘glamping’ in our Shasta Airflyte with our two Bichon Frise pups.

Alumni News

Jaxson Jarviswas born on November 15, 2017 to alumni Jacob Jarvis (MS, 2018) and his wife, India

Amelia Rockett Lindsay was born on January 15, 2018 to alumnis Ryan (BS, 2008, MS, 2012) and Carrie (MS, 2011) Lindsay

Gavin Brennan Morganwas born on January 22, 2018 to alumni Ryan Morgan (PhD, 2015) and his wife Christina as their second son

Francheska Rose Sepulvedawas born on June 12, 2018 to current PhD student Frank Sepulveda and his wife, Sarai

A warm welcome

In memoriam

BAYLOR GEOSCIENCESALUMNI NEWS

6867 PHOTO BY JOSHUA FULLERNEWSLETTER FALL 2018

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